Tessitura
by AugustRiddle
Summary: When Q met 009 for the first time, he didn't know what to make of her - or to have the car go missing on the day she arrived. After Bond's decision to go rogue, Q thought it was the end of surprises, until after Bond's current pursuit on SPECTRE revealed deeper secrets within MI6 files: murder, the Quantum, SPECTRE, Bond, and strangely - 009 herself. Spectre canon.
1. New Faces, Old Games

**A/N:** Welcome to Tessitura.

* * *

 **I**

 **New Faces, Old Games**

* * *

 _"Make me disappear."_

Those words, quiet yet chilling, sent Q's heart to pace nervously as he stepped out into the open air, caught in a frozen moment as he stood still within the shelter of the Vauxhall Bus Station. His eyes were fixed towards the terror that was the SIS building, charred and crumbled to pieces with a sinister darkness at its core. It was once the heart of the fire, an attempt full of raging blood caused by the chaos of secrets - secrets now even he had to shoulder. The previous night, when 007 had asked the favour to disappear, Q consistently questioned his own agreement. He answered to M, he always did, and being the new quartermaster - Q thought to be faithful to the terms he accounted himself for. But there was something about it, an admiration of sorts, that made him agree to it. It was only for 48 hours, a word was a word, but he couldn't help but slightly suffocate at what he had gotten himself into.

"There you are." a voice called out to him. Q turned towards the sounds of the footsteps and the shadows that overcame it, blinking. It was Tanner. "You're a tad late. I've been waiting at the docks."

Q stayed silent as Tanner stepped and stood right by his side, gazing right at the same view he had just stared at. Tanner breathed out an audible sigh, heavy in both bitterness and regret, as they were once again consumed by the noise of the arriving bus and civilian chatter.

"The price we pay." Tanner muttered in a way only Q could hear, digging deeply into his pockets as the chill of the River Thames whispered a breeze.

"I don't miss it." Q muttered back, suddenly shifting in movement before he turned away from the destruction and passed Tanner by the shoulder - pacing away from the station and towards the docks, "We don't want to keep 009 waiting, Tanner."

* * *

The everyday boat ride was not as unpleasant as a plane ride would be. Q hated planes, but boats were of a small inconvenience - a bearable inconvenience - especially if it meant he could protect the system and the technology even better than before. As he and Tanner entered the tunnel and reached the docks of his office, Q stepped himself onto the platform with his bag tightly gripped around his fingers. Water was never friendly with electronics.

"I'll be seeing you." Tanner called out to him, as he stayed on the boat as opposed to stepping onto the platform with him.

"You're not coming? I thought you'll be briefing 009." Q asked, with an eyebrow slightly raised.

"Already did, _she_ knows what she needs to know." Tanner replied, shrugging off the heavy day ahead of him, "I have to go with M to that CNS meeting, especially since C is rather aggressive in dissolving us. The Nine Eyes Program is too attractive to other nations to be ignored. Take care, Q."

As Tanner drove away, Q stood and wondered, _she_? Not that it made any sort of difference, they all seem to belong to the same breed of headaches. He did not brief himself too well with her files, and most of an agent's data only referred to them by number. The events prior being moved in this bunker - Skyfall, Silva, and M - gifted Q with the obsession of protecting the system. After he had let his arrogance allow Silva the advantage of escaping through hacking the system, he has been more careful than ever. He was not worthy of his duties if he could overlook such possibilities. Not to mention, 009 has been active in her own assignments even before his instatement. This would be the first time he would ever meet her.

Q walked up to the doorway of his guarded office, once again reminded of Bond's request. He cursed silently at the thought of his job being on the line, and the consequences it would make. All he had was Bond's word, but if Bond finds himself dead - that word won't matter. His thoughts stopped at the sight of his door ajar, a green light flashed in the darkness that told of someone's intrusion. Q felt his chest pound, something was wrong here. He looked at the two guards that stood still before opening his door further, peering through his frames for any signs of a break-in. None. Everything was in the way should be, but this only made him feel less at ease as his eyes traveled to the closed garage door that housed the DB10 prototype.

"No..." he muttered to himself as he dropped his bag to the side, reaching towards the nearest table with shaking fingers as he struggled to open the garage door with the remote. The mechanism's slow unfolding was the longest that Q had found himself experiencing, and as his hands grew colder, he felt his face lose colour at the absence of he DB10. It was gone. "Oh shit."

"And so he stole it." a voice sighed from the shadows, a deep, husky, and feminine sound that distracted Q from the missing DB10. A woman surfaced into the little light the bunker had, dressed in an all-black attire with the components of a long black overcoat and the collar of a black shirt peaking through. Her hair, a bright wavy blonde, was cut short just above her pointed chin and rested clumsily against the square of her jaw. "Spoiled men are hard to tame."

Q stared at her presence, startled by her silent entry, and taken aback by her brief commentary. It took a deep breath to grant him a moment of composure, one that allowed him to focus on the matter that was supposed to be at hand, "009."

"009." The blonde woman repeated in affirmation, nodding as she trailed quietly to his side, calmer than the storm that stirred inside him. "Well, it was supposed to be _his_ car. I technically stole it from him."

"It's not stolen when it's _reassigned_." Q countered, with a voice calmer than he thought to project, "Now I - this is embarrassing - have nothing for you but the weaponry and the potential to be fired."

A soft chuckle escaped 009's lips, carefree and humoured. She turned away from the empty garage, her shoes padding towards the tables behind them. Q rolled his eyes with pursed lips and a deep breath, cursing the fleeting nature of field agents and they're tendency to do as they please. Bond promised a short disappearance, but stealing his property - the DB10 prototype of all things - was out of the question.

"Keep that sort of face you have on, and M will see through you." she called out to him, followed by the scratching sound of a chair against the floor and the clicking of a mouse. The notion alarmed Q to look where she went and found her sitting behind his laptop, clicking and typing away with the blinking screen washing over her pale complexion.

Q scowled as he rushed towards 009 with the intention to rid the laptop from her grasp, but as quick as he was, so was her reflexes. By the time he had managed to close in on her, 009 had a leg raised with her foot aimed at his stomach - keeping him within a distance as she moved the laptop closer and further from him. He looked at her aimed foot with a sound distaste, before looking back at her to negotiate, "Excuse me 009, but that is my property. Do you think of this as a game?"

"Would you rather have a foot or a gun aimed at you? Your choice, Q." 009 replied, angling her head slightly to meet with his gaze. There was a prying nature within her eyes, and Q felt a slight discomfort staring at them yet he kept his eyes straight into hers. He wanted his laptop back. 009 smiled, seemingly impressed with his aggression, which prompted her to lower her foot in silent respect.

Q took his chance and slipped the laptop away from her hands, closing the screen before resting his hands firmly on its reflective surface. 009 made no attempt of fighting him for it, and instead rested her cheek against the flat of her palm while observing his gestures. "You're lying to M, aren't you? Bond's not in London, not after the current incident with the DB10."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Q answered with a tightened jaw, keeping his eyes on her as she did with him - a promise of sincerity that he had been struggling to establish. "Which reminds me..."

Q gestured a hand to the direction of the door that stood at the very back of the bunker. Frowning slightly, 009 gave him an amount of her suspicion as she followed him through the door. In the middle of the room sat an angled metal chair surrounded by multiple screens, with the chair's right arm extended further to support what seemed to be an apparatus composed of multiple metal arcs. Right at the centre, in between two arcs, was a vertical cylinder that dipped an inch into the circular frame.

"Have a seat, 009." he requested of her as he flicked a few switches at the wall beside the doorway, powering up the screens to life. "And roll up your right sleeve for me."

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you were about to torture me." 009 grumbled, yet complied to his wishes as she took off her coat that revealed a fuller view of her all-black attire. Sitting down, she rolled up the sleeve of her right forearm which revealed a slightly faded tattoo as she fitted her forearm through the metal arcs.

When the screens were active, Q stood by her right to where the apparatus was located, slightly glancing at her before committing himself to the screen, "That's a Russian prison tattoo."

"They don't make you the quartermaster for nothing." she mumbled as if in expectation of his comment, leaning back against the seat with her gaze at the screens before her, "A souvenir from my youth — 'Friends by Free Will' — or so _he_ told me. Long ago before I started believing in impermanence. Taking a life teaches you a lot of things — ugh! — what the—"

"Implanted." Q announced with an air of focus, giving 009 the assumption that he was uninterested with her monologue, "Smart Blood, 009. Nanotech that tracks your vitals and your location - think of it as an insurance."

"You mean a leash." 009 replied grimly, rolling down her sleeve as soon as the minimal bleeding subsided. Q kept himself occupied with sorting out her data, typing away at the computer that managed the room, "So that even Bond can't go dark."

"Agent safety is one of my many responsibilities." he reaffirmed, slightly amazed with how often she intended to use her sharp tongue for commentary. It was clear that 009 had certain problems with the systems that ran in the MI6, a common thread between all the other Double-O agents he had worked with, "I'm simply assuring that when you are declared dead, you are actually dead. The new M does not want another Bond situation to happen."

"Bond has been laying low even before Mexico, with no new missions assigned from M. Rather, _I_ have been doing _his_ job since after Silva and Skyfall with M giving me all the burden. Now even when officially grounded from operations, he's going around chasing shadows with MI6 property." 009 teared gaze away from his, occupied with her mind, "Where is he going, Q?"

Q kept typing without pause, as a moment of hesitance would only give her what she wanted. 009 was no fool to his facade, and from what he could see, she knew at least as much as he did. Maybe even more. But there were many things left unspoken, and even if Q knew well he complied to Bond's conditions, he knew little of what Bond wished to achieve from this stunt. "Frankly, I don't know."

"You do know, you just don't know what he's planning to do." 009 issued a tired grin, dressing into her coat as she rose from the seat. She ran her fingers through her locks of bright blonde like they were more an inconvenience than an asset, her eyes wandering once more, "However, I'm here because — you know why I'm here. Handover equipment and everything else I need, and I'll take my leave. The car - tell M I have it, which means you'll have to trust my word too."

Q was at his workstation as he listened to her words, ahead of her request as he packed what she needed in a small black duffle bag. Unlike that of Bond's favouring of a personal statement, 009 appreciated a heavy load. Finally coming to terms with who she was and what she is, Q wondered just what kind of Double-O operation she typically executes. As soon as he was done, Q zipped the duffle bag and faced her, "Field agents and their words. I suppose I have to comply based on 'having your word' don't I?" he took step closer to her, pushing the bag towards her chest as opposed to handing it with decency, "Heckler & Koch G36C, a silenced AMT Hardballer, and a prototype compact sniper rifle. If I didn't know better, I'd accuse you for a hitman rather than a spy. On top of that, your ticket to Prague. Return the equipment in one piece."

"If I was a hitman, would that make Bond a slag?" she retorted, sliding her arm through the loop handles of the duffle bag, the white envelope that held the plane ticket disappearing into her coat, "I take my chances with being a hitman."

As she started walking away with her goods, Q glanced at the metal box right by his hip - the watch. He did not give it to her on purpose to give him a reason to investigate her further. Though he had an understanding with most of what she shared of Bond, there was something in her words that made Q suspect that she knew more than what she letting him know - especially after she attempted to meddle with his laptop, "009."

"Yes?" she stopped by the doorway and turned to face him, the duffle bag dangling against her hip.

Q picked up the metal box and held it still, before outstretching his arm for her to reach, "Your watch. It's rather... Explosive. You have minute of safety once active." As she started reaching, he gripped the box tighter to catch her attention, "How much do you know, 009? Although you have tried to access my laptop, it was locked. Yet you spoke like you were reading it from the screen - how long have you been lingering in the bunker?"

"Long enough to watch 007 drive away with the DB10." A smirk pegged on her lips as her prying eyes studied him once more. From the way 009 surveyed him, Q knew that the woman underestimated his abilities. He couldn't help but feel slightly insulted with this conclusion, yet it was a simple truth written all over her mischievous face. "Along with a small chat."

"If you knew everything, why did you pretend?" Q raised an inquisitive eyebrow as he spoke, their grip still sharing the watch box.

"I guess you could call it..." 009 clicked her tongue lightly, adjusting the duffle bag that slowly started towards her wrist, "...a way to get to know you. You are the new quartermaster, after all. I don't know everything Q, actually I was hoping to coerce you to see if you knew more than I did. Bond talked too little for my liking."

With her side being expressed, 009 wriggled the box of his hand and into her full grasp before sliding it into the duffle bag. She zipped the bag shut before pulling her leather gloves from her pockets, sliding her fingers into them carefully. "If I may add," she spoke again in afterthought as she straightened her coat, flipping gloved fingers to reveal what seemed to be a photo of two cats of differing breeds, "you have really adorable cats."

Q, taken aback by the sight of the photo, reached for his pocket in search of his wallet. When he felt its leathered form, he knew it was there. As he kept himself with fishing it from his pocket, 009 chuckled that same chuckle she did the first time they spoke, settling the photo onto a nearby desk before disappearing out of the doorway. Momentarily distracted with how she managed to smuggle his wallet and return it without his notice, Q looked up to question but only found himself alone in the silence like she was never there in the first place. He walked up to the desk nearest to the door and picked up the photo - the lasting evidence of her presence - and probably one that he will remember for a very long time.

"How vile." he mused darkly for a moment, curious as he can be, before approaching the metal stool and opened his laptop. Another long day was ahead of him, and Q was certain this was only one of many more impressions 009 intends to make. But for the state that was at hand, the priority was to follow Bond's tracker and find out where he intended to go and come up with formidable lie that incorporated 009 as an alibi. All this in exchange for having their 'word', and Q wondered what is it that made him comply once more.

* * *

 **A/N:** Thank you for enjoying the first chapter! Don't forget to review/comment.


	2. Friends in High Places

**A/N:** Thank you very much for the response with the pilot chapter. Please enjoy the second chapter of Tessitura.

* * *

 **II**

 **Friends in High Places**

* * *

Prague, Czech Republic

"Well, this is a little inconvenient."

009 peered outside the opening elevator and entered the floor, scanning into the dim-lit, glass-encased emptiness as she pointed her pistol left and right in caution. Comfortable with the silence, she stepped out slowly while dragging what seemed to be a body of one of the building's security personnel. The City Tower was rich with life from the thriving businesses that occupied its first few floors, but as the heights escalated, so did the barren environments of unoccupied floors with overlooked potential. Hissing at the hassle of dragging a corpse, 009 shifted her arm and tossed the body towards a corner where it would not bother her; the dead man's limp position allowed the little light to form itself over the bloodied hole that centred itself on his head.

Dropping the black duffle bag she carried with her beside the corpse, 009 began to examine her vantage point. There was an advantage of being earlier than the time she should be, and as old habits go, examining her options was a part of her job that she liked to do. When she dragged out the compact sniper rifle case, it came along with a smaller black box. With interest, 009 set aside her weapon case as she opened the box which revealed an optical head-mounted display. Amused, she raised it up to have it reflected against the night lights, admiring the slick metal frame that held an augmented-reality system on the right arm of the eyewear. Picking up the USB wire which had her earpiece, 009 plugged it onto the eyewear's small computer body and booted the system as she wore it over her eyes.

" _009? Can you hear me?_ " echoed the voice of the quartermaster responsible for the technology. He seemed to have been waiting.

"Maybe." she responded, as she knelt on the floor and opened the case of the sniper rifle, assembling it piece by piece, "I could also be pretending to hear you."

Q made a low sound that even the slightly static reception failed to hide, and 009 could almost feel him roll his eyes as she placed the remaining pieces of the gun onto its main frame. " _How are you finding the eyewear? It's a prototype - augmented reality powered by small computer with more power than a smartphone. I heard you scope with your left eye, so I switched the placements. You should see the HUD at the corner - 'Head-Up Display', in case you were wondering._ "

"So you do know me, and yet you looked so surprised." 009 remarked, glancing slightly at the right corner of her vision and into the small screen attached onto the eyewear's computer. Her hands were steadying themselves against the glass in front of her, carefully placing glass cutter tool in the area she had measured out, "I see it. Time, location, picture of the man before I shoot him. I know what a HUD is, Q."

" _I didn't know you, I only knew what you were doing. This mission was primarily managed by Tanner since the Q-Branch had to temporarily go dark when we moved the servers after Skyfall. He bought your ticket, and told me what you would be needing and I couldn't be bothered too much with the setup. As for the headwear, they were originally meant for Bond before he was grounded. Switching the computer to the right eye of the headpiece was a last minute detail Tanner mentioned the day before you came._ "

"I assume, that this time around, you've had the chance to really read my file?" she asked, making herself more comfortable on the floor, the sniper rifle gripped firmly by both of her fingers as she waited patiently. "How have your cats been doing?"

" _I know what I need to know, Whyte._ "At the sound of her last name, the agent smirked. " _My cats are hardly relevant in this convers-_ "

" _Put me on, Q._ " entered M's deep voice. After a small period of shuffling noises, the line was at a steady and Gareth Mallory's voice was clear within her hearing, " _Whyte, do you hear me?_ "

"Loud and clear." 009, revealed Whyte, responded. There was a grudging respect to be held with Mallory, for she met him only a couple of times in the past and she always had preferred the previous M. "Although I'd like to say that you assisting me in this mission is hardly necessary. This is a quick task."

" _I beg to differ. From the records my predecessor left, you are quite a case to handle. I am just assuring myself that I won't be having any other loose canons to sweat over._ " M reasoned with his sound logic, cautious as they came, " _No unnecessary casualties, I hope?_ "

Whyte glanced to the side where the corpse of the security personnel lay beside the wall, before turning back to the view she had been observing, "None."

" _Q, give me a visual feed from the eyewear. I want to see what she's seeing._ "

" _Visual feed initialising._ "

"I'm positioned right across the PwC as I am supposed to be. I should be getting a clear visual of the meeting in five." she informed them as she returned to a half-kneeling position, her elbow resting atop a raised left knee as her right one rested on the floor for stabilisation as she held out the rifle. "Although I wished this thing was a bolt-action, not a semi-auto."

" _As you have been briefed by Tanner, your target is one of ours, but is a mole of the Quantum. We let him go this far in the hopes that he would lead us to them, that meeting at the PwC is just a cover. Intel confirms he's meeting with them to finally sell what he gathered. As soon as we identify the agents with him, we have to tie up the loose end._ " M briefed her with the things that Tanner had already told her not too long after she arrived from Moscow to London, and as he spoke, the mole agent surfaced in the light with two other men dressed in fine suits. Whyte scoffed lightly as she observed the faces of the men accompanying the mole, they really were Quantum agents.

"Has _she_ ever told you all the other details don't matter much to me?" she whispered, aligning her aim to go through the circle that she had cut through the glass, her left eye slowly peering into the scope as she began to aim her shot, "The less I know, the better. Keeps things clean."

" _Intel is protocol, 009._ " M interjected, matter-of-factly.

As the bullet flew to the opening of the glass and into the air, Whyte observed it carefully as it shattered the glass window near where the mole agent stood, before finding its target with the promise which was her aim. But as the mole agent collapsed and bled crimson spatter on his grey suit, Whyte stood frozen - taken aback by the events that just occurred. Squinting her eyes in suspicion, she peeked through her scope once more and calibrated its zoom, observing the mole's limp body and the amount of red that coloured his suit. Pulling away, Whyte cursed in a whisper as she slung the rifle across her shoulder, before lowering herself upon the floor as the sounds of gunshots emitted by the Quantum agents shattered the whole window of glass beside her. Being a level higher than the PwC floor she was targeting prevented the agents the advantage of a direct shot, but also gave her the disadvantage of shooting back with chance accuracy.

" _009, why aren't you evacuating?_ " Q's voice suddenly chimed into the constructed silence, but Whyte was too occupied with reaching for her pistol to reply quickly and decently.

"Am I holding you in too much suspense?" she shouted at him through the gunfire, rolling her body towards brink between the floor and the shattered window, aiming her pistol towards the two Quantum agents who relentlessly fired. "I missed my shot."

" _What do you mean? It was a hit._ " Q remarked, almost as matter-of-factly as M sounded. In the midst of exchanging bullets, Whyte managed to hit one of two into their death - enough to slow down the gunfire that came rapidly for her.

" _No no... There is a small likelihood of someone else there with you._ " M agreed but again with the underlying suspicion. He entertained the possibility, and Q fell silent from the line, " _Go back on the footage, Q. There. You see that? But it could be a blemish in the feed. But if you are correct, 009, bring me that sniper._ "

"If there is anything to tell about that 'someone else', he timed things perfectly." Whyte said darkly, rising from her seated position before pressing a button, "And he's a floor belo-"

As she pressed the button, the doors conveniently opened, but not without its share of company. A towering figure - a Russian man who was twice her size - waited for her within the elevator with fists clenched. Aiming her pistol to shoot, the man merely absorbed the bullet with no crippling casualty and grabbed the pistol from her. Ducking as his heavy arm came across for a blow, Whyte slid to the other side with her mind rattling for a solution. The assault rifle that Q packed for her - the Heckler - was stowed in the bag beside the corpse of the security personnel and beyond her reach. The sniper rifle strapped to her back was not much of a better solution either. Slowly walking backwards, the MI6 agent slowly raised her hands up as she watched the man recover from his miss, noticing a distinctive silver ring on his finger.

" _What are you planning?_ " She heard Q's mumble to himself, yet loud enough to be received through her earpiece. He, like everyone else in the Q-Branch including M, watched in anticipation for what occurs in the next few seconds.

" **Hey.** " Whyte called out to the man in fluent Russian, as one of her hands slowly dug into the pockets of her coat. She kept her gaze steady towards him, knowing that the live feed is only limited to her line of sight, and kept her pocket at the blindspot of M and Q's watch. When she took out her hand from her pocket, she revealed a distinct silver ring around her middle finger which was similar to the one that the man had. Whyte opened her palm out wider to reflect the light onto her hand, revealing a small red octopus engraved onto the silver surface. " **I am your friend.** "

" _What is happening?_ " M's voice echoed, but the agent kept her focus as she stared the man into his eyes. The Russian, confused as he eyed the ring on her finger, frowned as he hesitated slightly from his intentions, " _009, what the bloody hell is going on? What is he looking at?_ "

Sensing the opportunity that came with an allowance of only a few seconds, Whyte ran and slid across the floor to where the corpse of the security personnel laid - hastily opening the Heckler's box and rapidly fired towards the burly man without hesitation. It was too much of a narrow timeframe, that he came so close towards her before finally collapsing. When he fell down, Whyte stood over him with the rifle still aimed before firing another round of bullets onto his face till it was nearly unidentifiable. Agitated with how much time was consumed by this situation, Whyte slung the Heckler across her body before picking up her fallen pistol. Running into the open elevator, she pressed for the level lower - hoping that the other sniper was still beyond her reach.

" _What the bloody hell just happened?_ " M yelled through the other line, audibly vexed at the excess she had just displayed. It was just one of those things she couldn't help - the drive to fuel the storm within.

"I killed him, sir." Whyte replied dryly, keeping her gaze steady towards the elevator doors as she returned the ring into her pocket. Walking over to the corner where the buttons were located, she leaned on the metal frame as she prepared the Heckler. There was a good chance that an ambush waited for her once the doors opened - that is, if the other sniper was still within the premises.

" _We can see that, 009_." Q returned with small delay, but with the same biting tone.

When the elevator doors opened, the whole floor was just as dark as the one she was in. Holding the rifle closer, she aimed left and right with a careful sweep as she padded her feet across the silence. From the left, Whyte observed a broken window perfectly parallel from the room in the PwC but the equipment was swept clean. No trace of weaponry or the person himself - there was nothing but a shattered glass window at the place where the killing bullet has surfaced from. Has he gone away that fast? She cradled the thought with an amount of doubt, it was too good to be true. Everything about this situation was too good to be true. The only hard evidence she had of a second shooter was this broken glass, no equipment and no man to confront - just a dead Russian man with more bullets to his face than he could have shot.

"There's no one here." she confirmed, looking around once more with the Heckler aimed into the darkness. But even when she said these words, Whyte was coloured with a sense of an undying suspicion. The calm was more of a disturbance than a sense of peace, and the Quantum agents - even the one she had shot dead - disappeared from the scene. There was nothing left except the man she had killed and the man she attempted to kill, the two things that made everything feel less like a delusion. "Wait."

From the distance, within the building parallel, a small movement was observed from the form of the mole agent. They were traces of movement, but enough to represent the life that still breathed within him. "He's still alive. He's moving. Q, I need to get there. Fast."

" _What do you mean he's still alive?_ " the quartermaster inquired. As he went on, the MI6 agent slung her rifle back onto her back once more and assessed the space between the City Tower and the PwC building. It was an overwhelming distance. " _My immediate solution for you is to jump, there is no time for a decent entrance if you want the minimum time to get there._ "

"You're not serious." Whyte responded with bewilderment held within her. Her eyes were darted towards the ground, which looked more like an abyss the more she thought of her impending death. "I am not Bond. I may be a Double-O, but I am a marksman - not a parkour wonder. I am not going to make that jump."

" _Of course you will. Just run fast enough._ " As Q's words bled into her hearing, she could not help but scoff with resentment and admiration at his confidence. There was a fine line between misplaced optimism and extreme miscalculation, but on the other hand, she hoped he was genuine. M remained silent.

"You sound like an expert, why don't you come here and give it a shot?" Whyte retorted, while highly considering the option. She was not fond uncertainties, but this life of being what she is made a habit out of it. This was her only choice at the moment, and she was running out of time. She can't have this mole disappearing like almost everything else involved in this mission. "I'll even cheer for you."

Making up her mind, Whyte ran opposite of the broken glass window before turning her gaze towards the brightness of the distance. Tossing the sniper rifle onto the side, she placed her confidence on the Heckler and her pistol. She needed to be lighter in weight to keep her chances of surviving high, and if she ran fast enough, there was a momentum to gain. Sighing at the impulse guided by Q and the quiet confidence of M, she sprinted towards the broken window and into the open air. Placing her hopes at the wind that carried her, Whyte stayed afloat in momentum before finding herself at the brink of the broken PwC room. Shattered glass pierced itself through her sleeves, but the pain became tolerable when she realised she had made it - although barely. Through a force exerted from her shoulders, she pushed her body onto the stable surface with a moment of relief.

" _Told you._ " Q said a few seconds later, but sounded more like he confirmed his own suspicions.

"Right." Whyte breathed for a moment, before turning her attention towards the gasping mole agent who held on the little life he had. As concluded, he was not hit by her headshot, rather, by a mischievous bullet that managed to hit his neck. Slowly rising from the ground, she began to feel the parts of her body that broke from the leap. A consequence, she supposed, from a poorly performed stunt. Towering over mole's body, Whyte pulled out her pistol as she kicked him with the tip of her shoe, "You better start talking."

The mole, coughing slightly from her aggression, turning a half-lidded eye towards her way before laughing shakily at the sight. Like his neck, his mouth also bled its share of blood, and as he laughed he revealed more of his bloodied smile. "S-So... So it was you. Heh, I ne-never would have-" the mole coughed as more blood began to pour across the glass-ridden floor, "-thought it was you all along."

"Get to the point." Whyte aimed her gun towards him, impatient for an answer, her grey eyes cold and calculating. She was getting nowhere in this conversation.

"They said... They said _he_ would come for me, but it was you... It was you. You are..." the mole agent coughed before he could continue, and as he struggled to recover, he looked at her once more. But instead of immersing his gaze within her eyes, he turned his attention towards the little camera on the eyewear.

Struggling even with his own words, the mole curved his mouth to form the word, but his voice faltered to a point that even the MI6 could not pickup. Suddenly, in the midst of the tension, a gunshot fired life into the scene and a fresh bullet finally found itself on the mole agent's head. Whyte glared coldly over the corpse as she withdrew pistol after the shot, the mole's last words heard by no one but the evening wind that breezed into the room and cloaked by the shadows of the night.

"Assignment complete." Whyte announced, brushing away the glass fragments that were caught on her skin and her sleeves. She knew she was bleeding in more places than she could count, but that was a concern to dwell over later. As she headed towards the open door, she prepared the Heckler for the possibility of another attack from the Quantum. But as she walked down the empty hallways of the office building, there was not a soul found.

M gave no other commentary.

" _There should be a fire exit just at the next corner of that hallway. Sending map information to your HUD._ " Q cleared the silence with the presence of his voice. The whole mission almost felt like a dream, but it was that quartermaster's voice that kept her held with the reality, " _I'll take care of the CCTVs._ "

* * *

Whyte stepped out of the fire exit and into the evening sky, wearing her coat over the Heckler to not alarm anyone who happened to walk on by. Yet as much as she tried to appear normal, the blood that dripped from her sleeves continued to flow to her fingers despite her every attempt with patching it. Cursing with a voice only heard by anyone from a meter's radius, the MI6 agent rolled her eyes as she pulled a cigarette stick from her breast pocket and lit it with a slightly shaking and bloodied hand. After the first puff of toxic smoke, she turned her eyes towards the commotion of police presence surrounding both buildings; their eyes searched for an answer they could not find.

"Shit." was all she could whisper as her attention diverted, her eyes on her coat as she felt it become more drenched in blood. Frowning at the inconvenience, Whyte placed the cigarette on her lips as she hid her red hands within her coat while pacing faster than before. She did not want this blood to make a trail.

Whyte made her way towards a small roundabout that lead to a parking lot lined with with multiple vehicles. While on the plane to Prague, Q sent her a message containing an address to a garage near the airport where he imported a vehicle. Even though she admitted letting Bond go with the DB10, the quartermaster seemed to have been unable to dismiss the thought of sending her out without a vehicle. Slightly amused by the thought, Whyte stopped in front of a black Tesla Model S as the door lock popped into the surface when it sensed the key in the pocket with her cigarettes. 'It's a sedan, but it's faster than it looks.' she remembered reading from the e-mail, his modifications implied, followed by a whole paragraph about maintaining her word about Bond and the DB10 incident.

"Sorry, not sorry." Whyte sighed to herself, dropping the cigarette on the ground before stepping over it. A part of her thought about the litter, but mostly, her mind was filled by the unfortunate circumstance in which the Tesla would be soiled by her bloodied coat. Kindness had a price.

Settling herself onto the driver's seat, the MI6 agent took off the Heckler and tossed it onto the passenger seat, followed by a small ziplock containing a bloodied bullet that she recovered from the mole. After Q sent the building map highlighting the route to the fire exit, she turned turned off the eyewear before searching for the nearest first aid kit. It took a few, unrefined moments before she had successfully retrieved the bullet - but evidence was evidence. This was for her to take, not the police and not anyone. Along with the ziplock that held the bullet, she held the distinct silver ring with the glaring octopus insignia that she used to distract the Russian. Darting her eyes back and forth the two metal pieces, Whyte considered the connection as she thought of the Russian's ring back at the City Tower.

Was it really _them_?

"I don't like interruptions." she murmured to herself, lowering her gaze as she firmly wrapped her fingers around the item. Taking a deep breath, a small buzz rung from inside the car's cup holder. Whyte looked down to see her burner phone come to life, picking it up as it flashed the last name of the most notorious agent in the continent, "Bond."

" _Rachel._ " Bond responded with the same dry intonation, his deep voice slightly coloured by innate impudence. " _You gave the burner to Moneypenny?_ "

"I placed it on her table before I left for Prague." Whyte spoke with distraction, her eyes still wandering back and forth the bullet and the ring. She was occupied in her own thoughts. "And after I met with the quartermaster. He has two cats."

" _And a mortgage._ " Bond added, before the distinct sound of roaring winds clouded their reception for a few moments. Whyte knew he was driving - probably through an open countryside - somewhere in this vast continent. But where exactly that was, she did not know.

"You sound concerned." she frowned as she closed her fingers around the ziplock and the ring once more, distracted by the new information concerning Q. What she knew of him were things she extracted by force, and a mortgage was not exactly something you'd find in his wallet.

" _You sound jealous._ "

"Maybe I am." the female agent countered with a raised brow. Bond drew a low snort, sensing the naught in her tone. Whyte has never heard Bond laugh the slightest, and this was the closest she could get - and it wasn't even much to be amused of. "You will never tell me where you are, won't you?"

" _Not a chance_." Bond's immediate reply came confident. He was still driving, but the wind less audible than before.

"Don't worry." Whyte assured him, placing the ziplock on the passenger seat before resting her wrist onto the steering wheel. Her fingers began to play around the silver ring, fitting it to her middle finger with the octopus insignia glowing against her palm, "I'll find you."

* * *

 **A/N** : Thank you for reading the second chapter of Tessitura! I am grateful for all the comments and support, and don't forget to leave comments/reviews for this chapter as well!


	3. Fool's Gold

**A/N** : Here we are with the third chapter of Tessitura. Please enjoy.

* * *

 **III**

 **Fool's Gold**

* * *

It was cold, like the metal surface of his work desk. There was a small voice, faint. Water. Wet. Rain. A gunshot. The mole agent was by his feet, staring into his eyes and whispering, 'Not such a clever boy'. He felt someone hold his hand, it was 009. They were running through a fire exit. She was laughing. It was game. She spoke only in Russian. Red. Black. Red. The smell of tea biscuits. A fall down a cliff. A time in his youth, he was young again, standing at the Tube on the way to the SIS. Blue. Yellow. White. Sky. Ocean. Boat. He was in a painting. The art gallery was in the train. Silva dressed in Bond's clothes, asking, 'Did you make me disappear?'. He was running again. A girl with grey eyes. He stood on the edge of a building, but he was not going to make the jump. Bond was on the other side, a dying M in his arms. Bond wanted him to jump. It was the only way to save her. The smell of tea biscuits. A touch on his shoulder. A voice in his head. A voice in his head.

"Q!"

The quartermaster opened his eyes as he heard his name again. But this time, it wasn't a voice in his head - it was a voice right in front of him. Finally aware that he was not in a dream anymore, Q sprang up from his desk as he hastily fixed his crooked glasses. He had fallen asleep in the workshop before he even knew it, something that the stress of this job tended to make happen in moments when he was needed the most. Clearing his throat, he looked up at the figure of the person who woke him up - the voice in his head. In front of him stood Eve Moneypenny who held a box of biscuits and two takeaway cups of tea, complimented by an amused expression at his surprise.

"Moneypenny." Q exhaled for a moment, lowering his shoulders as he attempted to be calm. He was already embarrassed enough to be seen slouching over his desk, and the slight daze from waking up did not help.

"Good morning, Q." smiled Moneypenny, her easy manner of speaking made him more uncomfortable. It was not until she said it that he realised that he spent the night sleeping on this desk, and the bunker lacked the windows to make him aware. She settled the box and cups right beside his open laptop, before frowning as she suddenly looked down while lifting a foot slightly, "Why is your floor wet?"

His period of anxiousness disappeared when she remarked about the wet floor. Wet? Impossible. No one has stepped into this workshop since M yesterday during debriefing, and the floor couldn't possibly be wet. Bending down to look at the place Moneypenny indicated, Q found a trail of water to lead up to his desk, and as he looked back to the surface of the table he quietly investigated. He scanned his eyes from his open laptop, Moneypenny's biscuits and tea, some papers, and then lastly, he spotted a red envelope that was not there before. Cautiously, Q reached for the envelope as he scrutinised the ink-stained handwriting across its surface. It was terrible handwriting, terrible in his standards, but readable nonetheless.

"What's that?" asked Moneypenny, who had been watching him the whole time.

"Just a memo from Q-Branch next door." he quickly said, shaking his head. Q folded the envelope and tucked it into his pocket before she could look, shifting uncomfortably as he tried to switch the subject by looking at the cups of tea, "Which one? I didn't expect you to be coming."

Moneypenny shrugged before pointing to the cup on his left, before walking towards the opposite direction, admiring the mess and the prototypes it created. "I have some documents from M. He and Tanner are off busy trying to 'compromise' with C, so I'm running errands for them. He said you'd be here early in the morning, but I didn't expect you to sleep over. Have some biscuits, I didn't know what it is you like so I bought all kinds."

"Thank you, and the papers?" he followed after, while he drifted his eyes towards his laptop as Moneypenny began to shuffle into her bag. After a few moments of typing, he brought the screen to life which revealed all the windows and files he worked on.

Open windows of text, files, and videos - particularly what he has recorded from Whyte's live feed - lay open before him on the screen. Ever since last night's incident, Q had been obsessed with investigating the feed. Every frame had an answer, and if studying each moment would give him an answer, it was a chore worth doing. The obsessive repetition managed to haunt his mind, that even though he could only now remember so little of his vivid dream earlier, the face of the dying mole agent continued to haunt him. There was a difference between damage done from a few keystrokes, and the damage done from a trigger pulled. It was a distinction he once had simplified - underestimated - but now his thoughts began to change. Q wondered if it was because of the feed, of 009's excess with her bullets, or something else.

"Here you are." Moneypenny followed after the small silence, as she slid the papers across his desk. While she swept into the motion, her eyes glanced at his computer with more curiosity than he expected, "What are you looking at?"

"Just the feed from last night. 009 had stirred a bit of trouble in Prague." he replied, sipping the tea she had thoughtfully bought for him. Moneypenny was a field agent once, and this information was not entirely confidential. They had worked together before, and Q knew to trust her. "I'm trying to gather what I can."

Moneypenny slanted a brow as she looked back and forth the screen and him, noticing his particular interest with the few seconds before the mole was shot to his death. "You seem fixated."

"It's just... He seemed to be saying something. At least until Whyte shot him cold." Q remarked in almost a whisper, his eyes searching endlessly.

He had been replaying the same few seconds since last night. Everything about the mission was strange, but what Q found most intriguing were the words he had never heard. Q pressed a button on his keyboard, and the feed looped back to the last few seconds before the mole was shot to his death. Moneypenny moved slightly closer to his side, attempting to get a better angle while watching the scene. She was as fascinated as he was, but Q knew with the amount of time he spent dissecting the video second by second, he was more engrossed.

 _"They said... They said he would come for me, but it was you... It was you. You are..."_ the mole agent's lips move to form his last words, and again, Q found himself squinting at his lips. It quivered, pointing forward, to pronounce a name or a description.

"She is what?" Moneypenny asked, held in a moment of suspense as they watched 009's bullet find the mole's head. "Maybe he wanted to say 'James Bond'? This was Bond's mission after all, I heard from M."

"His lip movement, doesn't seem like he was about to say something starting with any of his initials, more so, his agent number." he replied, shaking his head. He had thought about the possibility, but the thought did not sit so well. It did not make sense either. "An 'F' or maybe a 'V'. Fo... Vo... Hmm."

Moneypenny, after being so distracted with what she had witnessed, turned her gaze towards the quartermaster, "Q, how are you sure this is not about her? About 009? He _could_ be referring to her. Personally."

"I thought about it," he had considered the possibility, more than once, "but when I checked her files she is rather... Undecorated. No army service, no special anything. It's a wonder how she's even an agent of this calibre, when the best thing she's got is apparently being a good shot. Her files are too clean, no criminal record - almost like a good citizen, but I highly doubt that."

After he had spoken, a small beep emerged from Moneypenny's coat pocket. Familiar with the sound, she hesitated without making an effort to check, her face visibly intrigued with the information Q has shared. She glanced at the screen once more, then back at him, and Q knew that she was about to say goodbye. They had their own duties, after all. Holding that thought, he placed a hand over the pocket that hid the folded red envelope, swallowing slightly at the anticipation. When did _she_ come around to pull off such a stunt? _She_ must have seen everything, everything except what lay beyond his locked computer. He grumbled at the thought of _her_ amusement, that vile darkness of her grey-eyed gaze scrutinising his obsession over the feed. Q reminded himself that it was part of the job, but he could not help feeling flustered and he did not know why.

"Well, that would be M." Moneypenny sighed after a moment, retreating from the table and began to fasten her coat. Q watched her as she carefully paced the puddled floor, fixing her bag over her waist with her hand reaching for the bunker's door.

"Moneypenny."

She paused, turning towards him, "Yes?"

"Do you know what he's doing?"

"A shred, but not completely." Moneypenny shrugged, giving him a soft smile, before turning back to the closed door she was about to open, "I think we have different roles to play in his game, Q, but I'll keep you posted with what I know. He hasn't contacted me since he left, but if there's anything I can tell you about Bond - I think he's just getting started."

* * *

Q entered the auditorium of the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, which is a bus ride and a ten-minute walk away from the SIS bus station. The red envelope, which he half-expected to contain substantial information, held a single ticket to tonight's show of the Royal Opera House's _Orpheus_ at this very place. Although initially hesitant, Q attempted to dress better than normal, using the old suit and tie he once wore when he met with Bond at the art gallery with his jacket draped over. Looking around, he settled onto his seat, nervously eyeing the people around him. The envelope, after all, was only a written note. His thought of _her_ appearing beside him was more of an impulsive assumption. Q knew he should have been more careful.

"You're strangely uncomfortable." a voice remarked right beside him, Q turned slightly to see a black-haired woman sitting right beside him. She looked straight towards the empty stage instead of him, her arms folded over her simple long-sleeved turtleneck dress, and her lips curved in that familiar smirk.

Q looked ahead as well, his shoulders calming slightly as he frowned, strangely unsurprised by her entrance, "I'm not uncomfortable, 009, I am simply inconvenienced. What are you-"

Without a word of notice, Rachel Whyte place her hand over her head and pulled off the black wig she adorned. As the synthetic black locks flowed away, a mirage of short wavy blonde hair bounced messily against her pale cheeks. She turned her eyes and stared into his, absent of any kind of embarrassment, "What? You don't like it, so I took it off. Sometimes I just don't like showing up as myself."

"I did not say a word of not liking it, Whyte."

"I can see it, you were criticising it. So, I took it off."

"It's because the blonde is fitting." the quartermaster blurted in short of a whisper, attempting to calm her rising voice. The agent was oblivious to the lights dimming, and Q had to do his part of keep her voice lowered. When he realised he had complimented her, he cleared his throat and moved slightly within his seat, and he felt her smirk grow wider even when he dared to not look at her. "Why are we here, 009? If it's important, we can discuss it back in my office. This is unnecessary."

"I heard you first met with Bond in an art gallery, I had to step up the bar a bit. I'm hardly familiar with opera, but I wanted to be as pretentious. It's a courting process." Her voice was now reduced to a whisper, and they both watched as the curtains opened with the opening act. She folded her arms again, reclining slightly to her seat.

Q fell silent for a moment as the stage began to capture his attention. From the corner of his eye, to the right of the row, he felt the chill of someone being watched. Slowly, he slid a short glance before looking away - it was the man from the feed, the other Quantum agent that Whyte failed to kill. He knew this from studying the video endlessly, and that very man sat only seven seats away from them both: far enough to not hear a word they talked about, but close enough to pursue them. Q kept his eyes on the events that played on the stage, focused on his composure to not alarm the agent. He was tempted to look towards Whyte to speak to her, but he still felt the Quantum agent's eyes glued to their direction. The man was watching him - watching them both.

"We have company." Q murmured, breathing lowly, keeping his hands clenched in between his legs to hide his anxiety. "The other agent you did not kill is about seven seats away from us."

"He's on time." she only replied, and Q realised the real purpose of this meeting - with him being an accomplice and in danger. "Keep your composure, Q, he'll know."

"You're trying to get me killed, Whyte." he whispered back through gritted teeth. He paid no more attention to the opera, as the Quantum agent began to occupy his mind. Whyte, on the other hand, seemed unfazed by the whole situation. As he tried his best to keep still, he felt her hand slip into his jacket pocket, "What do y-"

"Don't move." Whyte quickly warned him, her eyes still seemingly attentive to the opera - as far as his peripherals can tell at least. "It's the bullet from the other sniper. I want you to run it through the system, just in case things don't go as planned tonight."

"What is it with you field agents and taking advantage of my services?"

"Isn't that what you're here for?" she slid another one of her smirks, and turned her head towards him. Q felt compelled to look back, and as soon as he did, Whyte suddenly took his hand and rose from her seat as she began moving across the row.

Confused, Q stood in a hurry as he tried to keep with her pace. Whyte's black dress floated against the darkness, and her bright blonde hair glowed against the stage lights. While following her, Q felt the Quantum agent walking behind his back, and he felt his body run cold at the thought. 009 arranged for this to happen, to have him involved, but why? In what way was he so useful to her? Surely, she could have dealt with this tail herself. Q saw his presence as unnecessary, almost like a nuisance, but Whyte held his hand tightly - refusing him any chance to let go. Already flustered by the situation, he looked at their interlocked hands which she initiated. She was too bold, and he couldn't read her mind. All he could do was follow. For now. He will figure her out, eventually, for her clean file gave him a reason to suspect her. How could this person - with no army experience nor intelligence background - find her way into a Double-O status?

Once they were out of the playhouse, and into open public space, Whyte dragged him to the right of the sidewalk, which led down to the intersection of Park and Emerson Street. As if estimating her time, she slowed her pace and swept a glance around the area, "Surprisingly lonely for an opera opening."

"I really don't like you right now." Q returned, dipping his head slightly as her grip only became tighter. She was not planning to let go, not anytime soon. He dug into the pocket that Whyte had snuck the bullet into and felt it there, his fingers felt the cold metal through the ziplock. He swallowed.

Whyte chuckled like everything was like a game, a small sport of hide and seek with his life on the line. Truly, he wondered, if she knew what she was doing. Confidence was a deceiving trait. "That's just right now, Q, that can change."

As they walked down the intersection of Park and Emerson, Q felt and heard the distant footsteps of the Quantum agent. Whyte held him tightly, her composure calm but her pace quickening. Reaching the intersection, Whyte curved their direction to the right instead of crossing. It was here that she had finally let go of his hand, placing a finger on her lips to keep him silent, tugging on her dress to reveal a small part of her ankle. Just above her low-ankle boots was a holster for a Walther PPK/S similar to Bond's, with an extra pocket that stored the silencer. Rising back up, Whyte hastily fastened the silencer onto the muzzle before leaning against the wall in anticipation. Q kept himself still, leaning on the wall right beside her, breathing lowly as his chest pounded.

The Quantum agent appeared around the corner with his gun held up. Whyte slammed the agent's raised arm to the side with her left elbow, effectively dropping his gun as she threw her right fist underneath his jaw to stun him slightly. Q immediately ducked as soon as everything began to happen, barely missing a fired bullet that the Quantum agent managed to pull before being disarmed. Stepping back slightly, she kicked the disarmed gun with her heel towards the quartermaster's direction, before shooting the agent's knee with the Walther.

"Alright, Q?" Whyte breathed, before pulling on the agent's collar to drag him further into the lonely street, the end of the Walther pressed on the skin of his cheek.

"You and I have very different standards of 'alright', 009." Q yelled back, slowly standing from his ducked position as he brushed on his jacket, picking up the disarmed gun. Because of his involvement in weapons technology, he knew how to operate and shoot a gun - but only for the sake of innovation. Nevertheless, he felt safer with the gun held shakily around his cold fingers.

Whyte did not reply as she threw the Quantum agent to the ground. Gasping, she bended over the fallen man with her free hand rested against her knee. When he looked at her shadowy silhouette under the dim street lights, Q could tell that a cloud of exhaustion has taken her. Whyte took a few moments of audible breathing, then rose back to a better posture with the Walther aimed at the agent, "You know, I don't like getting interrupted on a date night. Why are you following me?"

Q felt his throat dry. A date? He shook the thought away as he cleared his throat, and looked away as if he had never heard it. Then he realised, "I thought you knew he was going to be here?"

"I lied." Whyte answered quickly, much to his surprise. He wasn't arranged to be here, and she was bluffing all this time. Everything that just happened was spontaneous. Her eyes were focused on the agent, staying true like a predator on the hunt, "Who sent you?"

The Quantum agent smiled a bloodied smile, his collar in wrinkles and rips, laughing as he eyed her pointed gun, "Insurance."

Q watched as her armed hand quickly moved the gun away from the Quantum agent's face, and then swiftly towards his legs. A whisper of shot fired towards the agent's other knee, and sent him whimpering at the pain while Q jumped slightly at the unexpected. If this was a few hours ago, he would have been a bit more frightened, but after watching the feed from the Prague mission countless times - this situation did not disturb him as much as it should. What he was more nervous of, was that all of this happened in an open public space. This side of Park Street may be a little lonely, but there were CCTVs that are watching them at this very moment. He needed to find this later and clear it, before anyone from the Q-Branch decides to show it to M. Holding the gun did not do so well for him either, but he thought to rather have it in his hands than to a possible accomplice.

"So it's _you._ Huh. Wouldn't have thought it that... All that is... _You_." the agent continued talking, his body curled up against the bricked sidewalk, his hands pressed on his bloodied knees. Q noted the similarity dialogue that the mole agent and the Quantum agent shared, accompanied with a realisation once they looked at Whyte in a particular way. This was not coincidence.

Whyte, who grew impatient, shot at his thigh, "Stop talking in riddles, I can do this all night. Who sent you here? Who was the other shot in Prague? This all about Bond, isn't it?"

"009, I highly advice you make this quick. This is an open public space-"

"Q, stay put and keep watch."

"009-"

"Q." Whyte said firmly, as she remained towering over the Quantum agent, "Ever since Bond decided to chase around Quantum, the whole agency's been vulnerable. Whatever's happened in Prague, it's because of Bond."

"We're everywhere." the Quantum agent croaked bitterly as if he had already predicted his end, "Kill me? Someone will replace me. Marco Sciarra? He's getting replaced tonight. We're all expendable, working for the same cause. We die because we love power, and our legacy remains to fulfil that goal. James Bond is just one of our many ventures, _his_ current obsession. We'll ruin him, you and your friend there, and the MI6 at its core."

At the sound of the name, Q urged himself to step closer, "Marco Sciarra? The assassin in Mexico? He's one of you?"

" _That_ Mexico incident is connected to this?" Whyte turned to Q slightly, narrowing her eyes slightly before turning back to the fallen man.

The Quantum agent mocked at their shared surprise, whimpering slightly at his bleeding legs, "I'm surprised that your agent Bond hasn't mentioned it. He... He should have figured it out by now and probably on his way. There is a bigger picture, one... One _you_ would know so well. But I... I see it now. You are playing a very dangerous game, Rachel Whyte."

"Oh shit." Whyte cursed as she knelt over the Quantum agent. Q rushed closer to her side, the vision of the incident becoming clearer and clearer as it came into view. A mountain of foam rested atop the agent's lips, his eyes were open and blank, and his body motionless. He was dead.

"Cyanide." Q muttered, scowling as he stood over her and the now dead body. His sounded more composed than he felt as his knees shook slightly, and his hands were colder than the gun he had held. "He played us."

"I knew that, I thought I could outplay him. But he's just as vague as that mole." she reluctantly admitted as she rose, kicking the body to keep her assured. She held a hand underneath her shoulder, and once again, the cloud of exhaustion was visible in her face, "If anything, taunting him with Bond did something. I was playing with a hunch that it all had a - ugh, I feel a little dizzy - connection of sorts with Bond. Apparently, I think it does. With the words 'his obsession', and the whole 'Marco Sciarra being replaced' event, I think we are getting somewhere. Ah, I need a smoke."

Whyte stood a for a moment, looking into the nearest lamp post as she took a deep breath. Q looked at the body, before kneeling down to inspect the things he could salvage to investigate. Aside from the gun, the agent's phone could provide some insight - along with a wallet or some form of identification. If he could find any of the sort, at least. "Aside from standing there, 009, try helping me do _your_ job."

"Smart Blood can track location, right? We should track Bond, and... Run that... That... Bullet I gave you through the system. The wife probably knows something, and we should cross-reference... Make a connection..."

She spoke in broken sentences, but Q looked up slightly to listen. Now that he really looked at her, in this slightly peaceful state, he found that if Bond's women was a standard of glamour - she did not have it. She instead possessed a striking element - a charm of sorts that he could not describe; a face appreciated because of its distinct features. Was it her eyes? The smirk that always seemed to be hiding something? Q did not know, but he was fascinated, and he wondered why he even thought this way in the midst of their situation. He concluded, as he looked back down to the body of the Quantum agent, that it was his initial suspicions of her that kept him. Curiosity led to observation, and although Bond would always be a rush of unpredictability to him, Rachel Whyte was something else altogether.

"I've only found his phone, so we'll take this and the gun." Q spoked after moment, concluding his search which was a duty that she should have been doing. But as he stood up, Whyte suddenly collapsed to the ground beside him unconscious. Q crawled to her side and held her to his lap, "009? Whyte! Rachel!"

As he shook her, the hand she formerly had gripped to her side unravelled and rested itself on brick-laden floor. When her loose palm opened to the sky, Q found it coated in blood.

* * *

 **A/N** : Thank you for reading the third chapter of Tessitura! Every comment/review represents support for this story, and I am very thankful for each and every one I receive. Don't forget to leave one for this chapter!


	4. Black and Whyte

**A/N:** Thank you for all the comments and continued support. Here is the fourth chapter of Tessitura, and happy holidays.

* * *

 **IV**

 **Black and Whyte**

* * *

When Rachel Whyte regained a fragment of her consciousness, the first sensation she felt were cold fingers that brushed against the side of her rib. The foreign gesture alarmed her, and before she found herself to be fully aware of the situation, she was sitting up with her fist in air watching a fallen quartermaster gasp wildly as he rolled onto the floor after impact. Whyte hastily looked around and recognised the dim-lit environment, and the confining interiors that held shelves of prototypes and tools. She was in the bunker - Q's workshop - and as she looked back at her clenched fist then to the squirming man on the floor, the MI6 agent finally realised what she had done. Her head still heaved a small pain from waking up so instantly, but the present became priority.

"Habits. What can you do?" Whyte cursed darkly, sliding off the table's surface where she seemed to have been resting on. She knelt on the cold floor, grabbed on Q's shoulders, and forced him to face her. "Please tell me I didn't kill you."

"You almost did." Q replied, his words strained by his groans. The quartermaster covered his nose with one hand, while the other lay flat on the floor to keep himself still. His glasses sat crooked on the bridge of his nose, dark hair disheveled, and his attention occupied by the pain of impact. When his eyes finally met hers, he quickly looked away with his cheeks red, "Bloody hell, 009. Please put some clothes on."

At his words, she took a moment to glance at herself. She was not naked, but she was exposed to a certain point. What caught her attention, however, was the compression wrap circled around her lower rib area. Whyte looked back at him, rolling her eyes at his overreaction, "Q, I am wearing a sports bra and boyshort underwear. If I was going to seduce you, I'd be doing a _better_ job than this dodgy attire. Besides, and clearly so, my current state is your doing. Now off with your hand and let me - you are bleeding."

"Now isn't that obvious?"

"Pardon me, I couldn't see it through your whining." she sneered, her grey eyes wandering, clicking her tongue as she held his wrist with one hand and took off his glasses with the other. Aside from the bleeding and the obvious redness that she had marked on his pale skin, a minor swelling ensued at the bridge of his nose. It looked slightly bent, but only because of trauma. "There's nothing broken, you can stop arsing about it now."

Whyte stood up and looked around, a hand on her head as she finally started feeling more of the dull headache of waking up so quickly. Q's glasses were still in her grasp, but it remained absent from her thoughts as she searched for her dress. "How long was I - no - the body. What did you do to his body?"

From behind her, the quartermaster slowly recovered and his footsteps shuffled. Her eyes searched quietly, but as she heaved a deep breath, Whyte felt an uneasiness within the compression bandage. It was a tolerable pain, and not as inconveniencing as it did before. Where was her dress? She trailed the cold floor with bare feet, Q's grumbling and sniffling louder in the silence, and her head still slightly disarrayed. A part of her expected the night to go through this way, but she had not expected it to end the way it did. When she arrived in London, Whyte knew she was strong enough to still have endured her damage in Prague, but even her body had a limit. A part of her was glad the bastard died before she fainted, but the bitter regret of not being able to shoot him herself stayed in her thoughts. She knew they were watching, they always were. That Quantum agent was never alone, and she expected that much from _them_ , but what she did not expect was the perfection of the timing they decided to pursue her.

"We moved the body to a quiet corner in the street before taking you here." Q told her as he settled onto the stool next to his work desk, his hand bundled with tissue paper to soak up the blood that flowed from his nose, "You were out quite a while, 009. I've been tracking your vitals using your Smart Blood file, and you were stable albeit unconscious. There's a crack in your rib area that is at least about 12 hours old, something I was about to check on before you punched me blind. I assume this was from Prague?"

Whyte paused at the mention of one word, uncaring of the rest, " _We_?"

"009, you are clearly overestimating me if you thought I could get you here on my own. I called Moneypenny." he scowled, his voice muffled underneath the volume of tissue paper that covered his swelling nose. She watched him look at her, but with a gaze half-blank. His eyes seemed to struggle without his glasses. "With interesting coincidence, Bond called her around the time we were dealing with our situation. He seemed to be onto something, one that I assume could be connected with whatever that Quantum agent went on about. I tracked him down when we arrived - Bond's in Rome."

He proceeded to tap a few keys with one hand on his laptop, his face closer to the screen than usual. Whyte approached to his side to inspect his findings, the dress now absent from her mind. Now that she was closer to his proximity, Q attempted to wriggle off his glasses from her grasp. She surrendered them quickly, her eyes now busy eyeing Bond's location and movement for the past few hours. Bond was on his trail, and the locations he has ventured through was just as she thought it would happen. For a man capable of the most interesting decisions, Rome was a predictable course of action and Whyte was glad that it was. Bond was as smart as they make him to be, but at the same time, it could only be the obsession that drove him to the right places.

Whyte felt a bag being pushed to her shoulder, and when she finally looked away from the screen, Q handed her a black paper bag with his eyes still focused on the screen yet with a face slightly tinted pink. "Your... Your dress was soiled - Moneypenny and I's fault. We struggled to sneak you through the MI6's security on the boat to the bunker, and things were a little... Complicated. She was kind enough to lend you some of her clothes. She left a few minutes before you woke up to attend to M before he left for Tokyo."

She looked at the bag before taking it from him, pulling on its thick strings to find an oversized cable-knit sweater, decently-sized jeans, and black trainers. Immediately, she began fitting into the sweater and then started on the jeans. As she fastened the button on her waist, she eyed his distracted face for a moment, then reluctant but necessary words flew out of her mouth, "I'm sorry for... For... The face."

Q did not reply for a few moments, and Whyte began to feel a little embarrassed. It was a word she rarely said, and most of the time, she decided to live with most of the things she had done. But when he finally spoke, it surprised her, "I'm sorry as well."

Taken aback, she raised a brow at his reply, "For what?"

"Prague." he said briefly, before another cycle of silence entered between them. He did not look at her all this time that he spoke, and Whyte wished he did so she could read his mind, "I felt that I haven't assisted you to the best of my abilities."

She chuckled dryly, shrugging her shoulders as she shook her head slightly. Whyte did not expect him to apologise for Prague, especially for Prague, because the intention was clear - the mystery established. When it happened, she had a sliver of what it meant for _her_ and what it was supposed to look like for them. But Q held everything in his mind, and she knew it when she saw it this morning, "There's nothing you could have done. Everything about Prague was meant to be difficult, if it weren't, then that other gun wouldn't have disappeared so quickly."

When Q did not reply after, and things returned to the uncomfortable. Whyte, who felt impatience and frustration when things weren't in her control, did not appreciate the atmosphere. She hated apologies, especially the process that it took. Frowning at Q's growing indifference, Whyte moved him by the arm and turned him away from his laptop. She ignored his surprise as she pulled the bundle of tissue paper from his face, inspecting the redness at the bridge of his nose. There was nothing, really, nothing life-threatening about what she did to him. But she was compelled to make a scene because his silence made her uncomfortable, especially now that things were cutting into the chase. Can this man, this quartermaster, really...?

"For the last time, there is nothing broken." she murmured, squinting her eyes as she shook her head. His eyes was a curious green hue, one that only shone in direct light. It surprised her, for she thought his eyes were black. "Stop holding it like it's a bloody mess."

Q pursed his lips, unenthusiastic about her assurance, and held at her wrists before prying her grasp off of his shoulders. He refused to meet her eyes, and continued on with his work, "I think you have made your point clear, 009, even if unscientific in analysis. Shall we get to work? I have to brief you."

"It's just as scientific as you telling me that running fast enough would enable me to jump buildings." Whyte retorted, unaffected by his suspicions at her confidence. Her eyes watched as his fingers pause slightly at the mention of Prague, she smiled at her victory and said no more. She gave him little proof as to why he should believe her, and from how he acted around her, she could feel his caution.

A clicking sound echoed at the doorway right in front of them, glancing away from Q, Whyte watched as the door opened slowly and revealed the figure of Eve Moneypenny into the dim light. Their eyes met for a moment in mutual understanding, before the she turned slightly to the guards standing by the doorway to see if they were alarmed. Whyte wondered how they managed to get her in the bunker without detection, especially with Q in tow. Q, from what she had observed, had both a sense of duty and a sense of loyalty. A contradiction that made him bold yet fear for his job at the same time. He fascinated her, because in a field where everyone smiled with daggers hidden behind their backs existed someone like him - who just wanted to do what they were supposed to do.

"Did I interrupt anything?" was Moneypenny's first question as her eyes travelled back and forth at their faces. When her eyes widened as she glanced at Q, Whyte knew what caused her reaction, "What happe-"

"Long story. Nothing broken, I assure you." she quickly replied, attempting to avoid an explanation. More so, Whyte only feared Q possibly mentioning her notion of apology. But she doubt he would.

Moneypenny walked towards the desk slowly, her eyes momentarily at Whyte's before focusing on Q. The redness had a dangerous effect on his pale skin, and it made the matter more controversial than it looked like. But instead of pressing on the matter further, Whyte noticed her shoulders relax as she began to accept the situation. Her arms were occupied with a brown paper bag hooked on her left, and a box tucked under her right. They met eyes again before Moneypenny handed her the bag, "I heard from Q that you were at the Playhouse before all the commotion. Apparently, you left your coat with the staff."

Whyte hastily took the coat from the bag and searched the pockets, sighing at the familiar form of a small black cardboard box. She was desperate for a smoke since before she even fainted, and now that it was in her reach, it was something to be done. As she lit one with her lighter, Whyte exhaled a slight puff of smoke, "I'm beginning to really like you, Eve Moneypenny. I already liked you when I heard you were the shot that killed Bond into a temporary retirement. Rachel Whyte, by the way."

"009, I don't appreciate you smoking in my premises." Q interfered into the conversation, finally without the awkwardness from earlier. Eager to spite him, Whyte leaned down till she was close to his face before puffing out a small cloud of smoke at his face. "Whyte!"

A sound laugh escaped her lips as she leaned away, watching him cough with his arms as she pressed the cigarette between her lips, "I hope you appreciate it now."

Q passed her a small, brewing glance as he recovered - something she gave little regard as contempt. Fixing his posture, he went back to his laptop and pressed a few keys before a window surfaced on the screen, "Moving on. As I was saying, I am to brief you. While you were unconscious, I ran the bullet through the system and interestingly, I quickly found a match. According to our database, the rifling of the bullet matches those of others found dead by the same sniper rifle. The rifle belongs to an assassin going by the name 'Volkov', who, was also responsible for the death of agents 003, 004, 006 more than 10 years ago. All killed in action."

"Volkov... I know this name." Moneypenny nodded, as she moved around the desk to take a better look at the screen. Volkov's profile in the database had no pictures to show of the assassin himself, only the evidences found in his crime scenes. "I heard he was the reason the M made her decision to reduce the amount of active Double-O's in the field. There used to be eight, now there's only three. Bond, Whyte, and 005. But this... This is impossible. He was taken down by the MI6 in 2006 - dead, I presume. Look, here at the text, see? Deceased. Strange, there are no details of how."

Whyte watched them as their thoughts stirred, before landing another gaze at Q with furrowed brows, "How are you so sure it's Volkov, when he's dead? Did you check everything?"

"009, may I remind you that this is an MI6 facility, not an underfunded American state police department." Q replied, reaching for his mug of cold tea that sat by his laptop. She watched him eye the cigarette between her fingers before proceeding, "Everything points to Volkov, no matter how I examine it. The bullet itself is an answer. This bullet is not surplus, but handloaded - catered and crafted to the weapon's potential. From the similar bullets found in his files, the very same components were used in Volkov's other targets that were killed by this rifle. The Quantum agent's phone was clean, I have nothing else but this bullet."

"If this man is a Volkov impostor, he went into detail with even copying bullet components." Moneypenny contemplated under her breath, "I had no idea Volkov was this particular with his craft."

"If you are going to kill someone for a substantial amount of wealth Moneypenny, you might as well do so with your sharpest sword. Besides, if this impostor managed to get his hands on Volkov's weaponry, he should have also taken his bullets. Which means, no immediate handloading was needed. He could simply shoot people as Volkov till his supply runs out." Whyte shrugged as she folded her arms for a slight moment, before bringing her cigarette back to her lips. She turned and began walking around the workshop, eyeing Q's hanged prototypes like it was the first time, "Volkov or not, this information confirms why I missed my shot. A 'renowned assassin' was interfering with my work."

Progress was steady from when the time she had fainted and caused a scene. Bond was on his way to figure things out for himself, while they stood here holding another part of a related puzzle. But no matter in what way Rachel Whyte looked at it, they were all pieces in a large, complicated game. The kind of pieces they each were to represent, however, was something to still be figured out. But from what she has observed here in the MI6, and what she knew about _them_ and _their_ goals, Whyte knew she was far from being a pawn. Not now, not anytime soon. This game was never about winning, but how many you can take down with you. In a world like this, there were no true winners.

"He shot first, and you followed, but it was done with such narrow time difference that it was not so noticeable in the feed." Q muttered, but the spaces in his speech made Whyte wonder if he was still submerged in thought, "But I understand it now, that mole... He thought you were Volkov."

Her wandering eyes stilled as he came down to his conclusion, and suddenly turned towards them as she leaned her back against the nearest surface. She was standing at the darkest corner of the workshop, but everything in this place was dim enough for her to notice the difference. Her mind was set to his hypothesis, "Where exactly does that fit? This was not my mission in the first place, this was supposed to be Bond's."

"No, look here. I've studied this feed more than enough times." Q insisted, firm on his proposition as brought up the feed from Prague with a few keystrokes. After brushing the tip of her cigarette against a hard surface, Whyte took the initiative to leave the corner and move back to where his desk was, curious of his proof.

"I know about you studying the feed, I saw it personally myself. You even passed out." she noted, chuckling breathily at the memory. Her words spoken aloud did not seem to settle well with Q, who cleared his throat as if to evade her laughter.

"The wet floor?" Moneypenny interjected, as if finally realising something. Whyte raised a curious brow to how she knew, before nodding to confirm, "That was you?"

"I swam. Couldn't risk security tattling to M I have arrived without the DB10." Whyte shrugged, which earned her a judgemental glance through Q's thick black frames, "What? I thought a quartermaster like you would be more open to creative ideas."

"Not when it involves soiling my workshop." he responded, cross in tone.

 _"They said... They said he would come for me, but it was you... It was you. You are..."_ the mole agent began to speak as the feed played those crucial seconds once more. Q seemed numb to the scenario, and when the agent died, he did not blink an eye.

"He said 'he', then he ended with 'but it was you'. As if solving a puzzle. Then when you watch his lips move, it doesn't seem like he was about to say 'Bond'. 'Fo-' and 'Vo-' were my first two choices when I studied this scene, now that we know it's Volkov. His lips saying 'Vo-', in an attempt to say 'Volkov' fits." Q explained, attempting to rationalise what already is a confusing situation. A dead man shooting at her target, and disappearing Quantum agents.

"Taken that this is not all just confirmation bias," Whyte said after a moment, absorbing all of the information the quartermaster tried to piece together, "It seems even that sorry piece of work does not know what Volkov looks like, and your _generously funded_ database can't provide a picture either. However, I believe this assassin is working with the Quantum. Put it in perspective: if this mole has been collecting data for months, and finally surrender this information - a ghost organisation like Quantum would never let you return alive."

"But why hire an assassin? They could just send their own men." Moneypenny argued, a fair point in all costs.

"To leave no trace." Q concluded for them both, taking another quiet sip from his mug. "Volkov has a signature - his bullets and his selection of weapons. By making Volkov the seeming culprit, they leave without evidence. The blood belongs to Volkov, and they remain a ghost."

"Regardless, I have to call this in with M. Volkov or impostor." Moneypenny sighed, shaking her head as she slipped her phone out of her pocket as she began to dial in M's number. "Hopefully, he has not boarded his plane yet. MI6 took down Volkov, but the data is strangely lacking. If anything, he should know what we should do next."

Whyte stayed silent, contemplating, as she determined for herself where it was she should go from here. For a moment, she thought she was certain - she still was certain, although broadly. As time went by, it became harder to contain the changes that were meant to happen. Adapting to change did not necessarily mean she was in favour of it, yet strangely, it was in favour for her. Her eyes fell on Moneypenny's figure who was busy trying to get in touch with M, and then to Q - who attempted to find solid ground in broken pieces. Whyte stayed her gaze at him, watching his mind work under a heavy expression on his face that almost looked like a scorn. For some reason, she felt like she made a mistake.

" _This better be good, Moneypenny._ " Gareth Mallory's voice echoed from Moneypenny's phone as she pressed the loudspeaker button, and settled the device by Q's laptop. " _My plane is about to take off_."

"Sir," Q spoke without further delay, his fingers busy with his keyboard, "We have obtained the bullet from the Prague incident, and our database matches it with an assassin by the name of 'Volkov'. I am now sending you all the details of my report to Tanner's tablet so you may see for yourself."

Once he had sent the data they had so far, no word was spoken from the other line. Whyte looked at Moneypenny, who seemed to be looking back at her while Q remained still and swallowed. A static breath rose from the line, as M's quiet cursing lingered before it ceased, " _This is not possible, the MI6 has taken down Volkov. When I was Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee, I made sure this fact was known to all departments. Especially after that bastard took down our Double-O's._ "

"We have thought of the possibility of an impostor, but on paper, it is Volkov." Q replied shortly after, although Whyte noticed the dissatisfaction on his face as he uttered his words. The issue kept Q in constant thought, that in the process his thinking began to show on his face. "I have already bypassed many security checks to obtain more detail on Volkov, but little information is listed. If there's anything more that you know, sir, it would be extremely helpful."

While they interacted with M, Whyte could only watch them her lips pursed sealed. To M's knowledge, she was not in London but still in Prague. Because Q held all the Smart Blood files, her location being known to M would be more of a difficult task to find out. The longer Bond fooled around with the DB10, the more fragile were her steps to make. But she knew, with all of the certainty her mind could make, that Bond will fail to return the car properly. It was just like him, that James, to use and expend. As her grey gaze found itself upon the clock by the wall, Whyte began to wonder how long exactly has it been since the incident by the Playhouse? If Bond called not too long ago, he must still be on the move.

" _There are only two people in this agency who knew exactly how Volkov was taken down._ " M spoke with his words carefully chosen, and his voice was reduced to a lower volume as he continued, " _Those two would be Agent 007, and Olivia Mansfield - the late M. 007 was the one who killed Volkov, and she supervised the whole process."_

* * *

 **A/N** : Thank you for reading the fourth chapter of Tessitura, don't forget to leave a review/comment. All are appreciated.


	5. Good Old Friends

**A/N** : Thank you for all reviews and thoughts! Every review is appreciated. Here is the new chapter of Tessitura.

* * *

 **V**

 **Good Old Friends**

* * *

"I believe this is yours, it looks important. I found it in the Walther's holster. Which is my property, mind you."

Rachel Whyte directed her eyes to Q, who held out a small silver token-like object toward her as they stood at the docks. It was the ring. After the call with M, and the probable involvement of a supposed dead assassin, the three of them proceeded on with their duties. Moneypenny, who left to try and retrieve what she could about Volkov, found a way to secure the agent a getaway boat. The boat's location humoured her, for it was stationed exactly by the backdoor she accessed when she gave Q his opera ticket the morning before the present. How Moneypenny made this boat happen was beyond her, but what mattered more to Whyte was the fond thought of not having to swim to leave. It may have worked once, but with the state of her body, there were better opportunities ahead to abuse her luck with an injury.

She looked at him for a moment, then back at the object between his fingers before taking it slowly away from his grasp. When she examined it upon her open palm, the menacing blood-coloured octopus insignia greeted her. "Just a keepsake of sorts. Are you sure it's safe for you to linger around? I imagine with that CCTV right behind you, someone in the Q-Branch is watching. This boat is not exactly as inconspicuous as my swimming."

"That would be my worry to handle." Q replied, confidence lingering in his tone. This was, after all, his department. Whyte chose to trust his words. He seemed to like looking straight into her eyes, searching for something she would not let him find, "But are you sure you're telling us everything?"

"What do you mean?" she raised an eyebrow in the instance of his inquiry. She did not expect to be further investigated, but yet she felt more impressed than insulted.

"Iosif Antonov, a young and dead Russian artist." the quartermaster drove straight into his point, as the London breeze swept along softly. He eyed the ring on her palm through his black frames and continued, "When I was investigating Volkov's files while you were asleep, he was one of the victims in the pictures. He wore a ring just like that."

"But where is your connection?"

"Friends By Free Will."

He concluded with those words, his gaze looking beyond her palm and lingered at her clothed forearm. Q gazed intently, as if he saw the mark in the flesh at that very moment. There, Rachel Whyte decided to keep still. She tried to anticipate him, and from his short breath, he too seemed to be expecting a certain reaction from her. There was no reaction, only the sound of water and her suspended arm holding out a ring part of a dark secret.

"I remembered, when we first met, I identified your tattoo as something of the Russian prison kind. Hours earlier, when I tended to your damage, I saw it again. It's not the prison kind, rather, inspired by it - made to look like one in a passing glance, then, as one look at it closely..." Q trailed, raising his hands as he began to fold up the sleeve of her jacket. There was a shred of caution in his movement, and Whyte did not expect him to make the contact that he was doing now. When her tattoo is unveiled into the open, he lowered his hands quickly back to his sides, "...it's exactly styled in Iosif Antonov's form of drawing in his ink sketches. Even when your files make it convincingly so that you were born and raised in Newcastle, your accent has more of London in it and maybe even a little American. In addition, the fluent Russian. You've been around, Rachel Whyte. But what are you hiding?"

She looked at the faded ink marked against her skin, an artistic piece that in itself was a scar she remembered so well. A small smirk tugged against the corner of her lips, while her fingers slowly folded over the ring as she asked him, "Would you have considered last night as a sort of date?"

Q, who was stuck in his inquiry, was visibly taken aback by the random question, "Excuse me?"

Whyte flew away with her own thoughts as she began to think more of what she would like it to mean for her, and how she wished to remember it instead of what it really was, "Yes, I think I'll think of it as a date."

As she nodded to herself, Whyte could make out the quartermaster's appalled expression as she avoided his eyes. He was watching her again, searching for an answer. The truth was still out there, and the truth was with everyone. But the humour dried sooner than imagined, and Q became harder to sway.

"I knew Iosif at one point in my life. 'Friends', I suppose, as far as friends go." she finally admitted after a deep breath. Her words spat out more poison than she cared to. She shrugged her arms as she leaned against the rail, staring at the CCTV camera that watched them carefully, "But the Volkov circumstance was beyond me. My father's job required a lot of... Travelling. I moved to Kiev from Moscow shortly after, and a few years later when I visited, his sister told me he died. A shot to the head."

"Why didn't you tell us about Volkov, knowing that you've a shred of him?" Q asked, his frown bleeding into his words. He didn't seem to feel betrayed, as more of his relaxed yet flat composure flowed as one of his hands found the rail.

Whyte shrugged briefly, treating it like a mundane oversight, "I didn't think it was important. Volkov was more like a myth until today."

"Anything is important - especially if this Volkov might be working with Quantum. He's killed three Double-O agents so easily, and if that's not dangerous then what is?"

"Do you have friends, Q?" Another one of her random questions fluttered from her lips as she folded her arms. She had a fancy for it, these random questions. They were things that crawl into her mind in the most interesting points of conversation, the very kind that earned her Q's brief expressions of feeling taken aback.

"I think 'colleagues' would be the more appropriate term."

They had a recurring pattern of speechless gaps in-between exchanges. Whyte highly doubt that awkwardness was the root of the cause, and rather, she suspected the gap was merely just the side effect of trying to read each other's minds. But their actions gave them so little to work with, that they both dangled upon whatever they could hold onto. Thinking about it made Whyte burst into a soft chuckle, so uncanny and random that she tilted her head slightly, as the back of her mind played on the idea of _them_ watching her at this very moment. Time ticked by so dangerously, and yet she still found it appropriate to kill more of her borrowed time with the quartermaster.

He arched a brow at her sudden burst.

She shook her head as she met his eyes, grey and green in hard glances. The chuckled faded away from her lips, "Don't have friends, Q. They're poison - liabilities. Just... Do what you have to do. Even if that requires the wrong things."

"Won't that be quite redundant?" he replied, but they both knew that the understanding was there. A moment after, a quiet buzz emerged from his pocket. When he fished out his cellphone, a small white square with text lit up the glass surface, "Shit. There it goes."

"What?" Whyte pressed on, as her eyes tried to peer onto the screen of his cellphone. It required no further effort, however, as the quartermaster flicked his wrist to show her what was on the screen.

"There is a bloody BBC article on the DB10. It seems as though Bond did not leave his 'situation' unscathed." he muttered, followed by an incomprehensible curse as a stream of murmurs began flooding his mouth, "Tanner should call as soon as they get some ground. I've no doubt someone in the MI6 main office has already tipped him an email."

While Q drowned in his seeming downfall, she squinted her eyes on the shaky cellphone screen, examining a perfectly put picture of the DB10 dipping into the waterside. There it was, she mused, millions of British government money burying into the nothingness. Its legacy, true to Bond's stylish ways of damage, were the words ' _Street race ends with a splash_ ' in a bold, black header under the world news tab of the website. Journalists - always in good time.

"You must appreciate the perfection of timing here, Q. They've got the photo just right."

"I think I care more about my job than the art of photography right now, Whyte. I'm on the line here."

"So you are." Rachel Whyte nodded, accepting the situation more factually than empathetically. She pulled a cigarette stick from her pocket and pressed it between her lips, lighting the tip with a flick of her lighter. The breeze still existed, but not enough to put out the flame, "But it is, in the end, a consequence of circumstance."

Q stared at her, "Is that really all you have to say? After you and Bond-"

He silenced abruptly as she stepped closer, unfolding her arms as she hid them behind her back with her fingers interlocking. A puff of smoke bloomed from sides of the cigarette that was still held in between her lips, and while she motioned one step closer towards him, he stepped back once in response before subconsciously freezing in place. Whyte smiled watching him, pulling one of her hands free to take the cigarette away from her lips, leaning to the side of his face just by his ear, "As I said, do what you have you have to do. After all, it's only in this part of the world where two wrongs make a right."

She felt her lips smirk at that simple truth, before pressing her lips softly against his cold cheek. He did not move, but he did breathe - softly, jaggedly, and then carefully. Whyte pulled away shortly after, her smirk still solid as she returned her cigarette between her lips. When he did not say anything, she buttoned up her coat and hopped onto the small boat Moneypenny had the bother to arrange for her. She squinted her eyes at the docks opposite from where they stood now, before turning slightly over her shoulder with his figure at the corner of her eye, "I'll definitely remember it as a date. I'll see you when I see you, Q."

There were only so many things she could possibly think that could go on in his mind at that moment.

* * *

Blood, again.

Rachel Whyte cursed as she sat on top of a man who lived until seconds ago, before she stuck his own dagger right into his throat. It was bloody, messy, and unrefined in technique. She had not fought in such a barbaric manner for a longer time than she could count, and she could only stare at her stained hands in disgust as she kicked his gun closer with the heel of her shoes before picking it up. The Walther - the very same one that she used last night - was tucked unused within the breast pocket of her coat. She hated the gun for personal reasons, but there was no way she would leave Q's bunker unarmed. Imagining the quartermaster's face once he notices she had stolen something again was an amusing thought, but the lasting humour will have to wait another time. Whyte took a deep breath, her eyes looked left and right the hallway of the dreary apartment floor. No noticeable witnesses so far.

After inspecting the gun on her hands, she examined the dead man she had just killed. From his face, the clothes he wore, and the hostility she was greeted with. Whyte had no doubt it was _them_ , they are here. The blood on her fingers were sticky, personally unpleasant, and she had no doubt that some had splattered on her face - maybe even on the short wavy strands of her bright blonde hair.

Holding the gun with both hands out, Whyte stepped over the corpse of pooling blood and paced silently across the hallway. The man was only one man, and there could always be more like him. Her eyes searched, actively than ever, observing spaced gaps on the walls which shaped itself according to the apartment doors in the complex. The light flickered above her, but only slightly. Her apartment was at the end of the hall, which could only mean that another man hiding in these spaces was more than likely. When she took another step, she found her answer.

The new attacker, who slipped out from the space third from the right of her doorway, erupted with his gun out. When he fired, Whyte rushed to the nearest left, rolling against the wall as she breathed heavily. She rolled her back closer to the edge of the wall and peeked into the line of fire, holding the her gun out and fired as soon as she spotted a wisp of his hair. When she saw his shadow flinch, she moved away completely from the wall and walked further to his direction as she fired three more times to keep him in place. As soon as the man dared to aim his fire at her, Whyte moved to a quick sidestep as a bullet flew out before kicking his gun to the ceiling - shattering the glass lights above them before raining along with the shards onto the ground. Unarmed, the man threw himself at her with a swipe of his fist as she ducked, kicking him straight on the chest as he fell against the wall where she shot him clean on his head.

"I really should have bothered with those martial arts lessons." Whyte murmured to herself as she cracked her neck, eyeing the deep scratch on her shoulder which she earned from the rather tedious knife fight from earlier. She was bleeding, again.

She held up the gun once more, keeping herself alert with all possibilities. Two may be dead, but two more could be alive and lingering. But as she reached her door through a carefully-paced scan, there was no one else to be seen. Whyte looked behind her and stared down the hallway, and then looked back at the door of her apartment. Quietly taking out her key, she pushed the metal piece into the lock as she rested a shoulder on the wall just by the door frame. The two dead men that laid at the hallway may have been more convenient kills, but what laid beyond her door was could be something else. Holding her breath, she turned the knob and pushed the door open as quietly as possible. She aimed the gun in full awareness, fanning her sights from the gloomy panoramic window in the distance, to the small kitchen at the nearest corner. Nothing - not even a breath was heard.

It was until she was about to relax her shoulders that she heard the click of a gun behind her back, and the faint shadow of a larger figure looming over her. When the stranger's footsteps padded closer, she felt the gun's muzzle press at the centre of her back. Whyte hissed at her defeat, pulling her hands apart as she raised her them up high. The muzzle dug deeper into her back in response, urging her to motion further into her apartment.

"Walk." a deep voice croaked. She did not know this voice, but she did as she was told.

They walked slowly first passing the kitchen, then the small alternate living area, until they began to walks closer to the open space where the panoramic window bragged a view of a gloomy London morning. She tried plotting her escape, but she knew she stood no chance against a larger man in a more physical combat. There had to be another way. "If you're going to kill me, make up your mind."

The man did not reply, and instead, pressed the muzzle further into her back where it began moving areas that slightly disturbed her rib injury. Whyte bit her lip as it happened, for she dared not let him know she was already vulnerable. The man did not seem threatened with her still holding the gun with one of her raised hands, and probably because he knew he had the better odds if she tried anything. When they reached the open space that had the panoramic window, Whyte felt her face harden at what she saw. A man with greying blonde hair was seated between the cushions of her sofa, seemingly aloof of her arrival which could also translate as his assured confidence that he had the upper hand. He held himself in proper presence, his arms folded across his navy Nehru jacket, and the lasting impression of his quiet sophistication. The man looked at her as she looked at him, like two predators without prey.

"Ah, Rachel Whyte. Unless of course, you do like that '009' moniker of yours."

Whyte felt her lips purse as he slowly pronounced her agent number, but she only responded by waving her free hand - still red with someone else's blood for him to see, "What are we doing here, Franz?"

Franz Oberhauser broke away their gaze and briefly examined her hand, then gestured to the side of the sofa diagonal to him, treating the space like it was his own home and not her own, "As you have experienced, I have prepared you a very particular homecoming. This is a personal meeting of a kind, and also an underlying warning about killing off my agents. Shall I remind you again that it's 'Ernst Stavro Blofeld'? But please, have a seat."

He will always be Franz Oberhauser to her.

The gunman behind her pressured the muzzle onto her back again, pushing her to the side of the sofa Oberhauser wished for her be seated on. Whyte looked over her shoulder with another low hiss, shrugging the muzzle from her back as she seated herself in her own accord. She settled the gun upon the glass table, a clear sign of surrender, "If your little Quantum agents tailing me around will ease you, it does not ease me the slightest. Insurance is built on grounds of distrust - will you please tell your insufferable brute to lower his gun?"

"I suppose your little MI6 adventure has shaped you a bit, or perhaps, you have become smarter than your mouth?" Oberhauser did not blink an eye, but turned to his gunman with a slightly raised hand, "At peace, Mr. Hinx."

The gunman, Mr. Hinx, grunted as he obeyed. He motioned a few steps away from Whyte, but kept a suspicious look directed at her and every move she may think to make. Mr. Hinx was nonetheless his own kind of intimidating, and she felt irritated by the mere fact that his large size proved him to be a harder fight. It was almost laughable to think of everyone who searched far and wide just to hunt down Franz Oberhauser, only to have him sitting on her couch in an apartment at the heart of London itself. The irony was not to be missed, and she thought to feel pity for Bond. If what happened in Rome happened the way it should, there was no doubt that 007 already saw this very face.

She knew about him - about _them_.

"Now," he resumed as his tongue rolled his accent, folding his arms once more. Oberhauser met his unreadable gaze with her piercing one, "I hope you are familiar with a rabbit box?"

* * *

 **A/N:** Thank you for reading. Don't forget to **review** / **comment**!


	6. Benefactors

**A/N:** Thank you for your continued support of Tessitura. As always, comments/reviews are appreciated. For more updates/thoughts concerning this story and other projects, visit my blog (linked on profile) from time to time.

* * *

 **VI**

 **Benefactors**

* * *

1 Year Ago  
London, England

M sat in her office, the heavy rain pouring against her windows as she sat in isolation. It was midnight, and the rest of MI6 had gone except for her. It has been exactly 12 hours since the incident, and although the she knew she made the right choice, the loss still haunted her mind. Sighing, she leaned back against her seat, a wrinkled finger resting above her lip as her eyes glazed on her laptop screen. She was writing his obituary - Bond's obituary - but she couldn't seem to continue as she stared at the blinking cursor at the end of the word 'Commander'. She looked away and examined the Royal Doulton Bulldog the very fool gave to her, and felt herself laughing slightly and quietly. James Bond had a sense of humour.

Her eyes returned to her computer screen.

The door of her office clicked open slowly, and although M jumped slightly, her shoulders relaxed and her face fell into a frown when she recognised her guest. She closed her laptop abruptly, shutting away 007 before folding her hands together on her desk, "You are supposed to have gone dark, Ms. Whyte."

"Good evening to you as well, Olivia." Rachel Whyte returned with a shrug, holding the door with her foot as she let herself in. She managed two takeaway cups of coffee with the help of hand and forearm, and her gleaming silver Hardballer with the other. The agent settled one of the cups beside the laptop underneath the lamplight, before seating herself on one of the seats opposite that of M's. "I heard the news."

"I reckon everyone's heard the news."

Whyte, who had her eyes held by the coffee she was about sip into, held a dry smile before the cup angled perfectly to her lips. After a small sip, she held the cup at eye level to amuse herself, "You know, this would never have happened if you sent me with him. I don't have to like Bond to keep him alive to get that hard drive, and if it's my intention of killing him that you're afraid of, I don't need a field mission to make that happen."

"You know why I can't send you."

M looked at the agent through the dangling lamplight that hung over her desk, the room now smelling like hot coffee and the cigarettes which always stained the agent's dark coat. Beyond her glass walls, there was nothing but darkness and no eyes were there to pry. She pressed her lips together, before reaching for the cup Whyte had set down beside her laptop. She did not like coffee, but she knew the agent brought it to spite her. But at the moment, she was willing to take a sip. This was it, after all, the sum of their relationship. It was a fine-tipped line hanging between friendship and acquaintances, and there was no clear indication of what it really was. They both sat here for a reason, and they both knew why.

The rain poured harder against her windows.

"I assume you have a Plan B?" the agent spoke again after a moment, with her grey gaze now directed to the old woman, who eyed the coffee strikingly. It humoured her, of course, seeing M's face make out this striking impression half-filled with disgust with the drink. "You've killed me with boredom all these years, that my amusement has gone as low as watching you resent that coffee."

"No." M said suddenly, still criticising the coffee and its bitter aftertaste. Something had occurred to her, a sort of realisation. "We have to keep going."

Rachel Whyte let out a loud huff, swiftly leaning away from her seat with waves of blonde moving against her face. She scrutinised the old woman, angling herself lower in an attempt to meet with M's focused gaze on the coffee cup, "Bond's dead, Olivia. It's over. You gambled, and you lost. We both did. The irony of your optimism is that you know I'm right, and the reason why you and I are here is because you are writing his obituary."

Her reluctance to respond at the spur of the moment, only made Whyte confirm that she was right.

M finally looked at her, but her face absent of anything telling. Instead, she held that typical hardened expression - a common sight to anyone in the receiving end of her commands. "Did you not hear me, Ms. Whyte? We keep going."

"You... You're fucking mad."

The old woman rose from her table and walked towards a locked cabinet, while Rachel Whyte gathered herself into a silent turmoil. The agent was taken aback - no - she was confused, uncertain, amazed, and maybe even impressed. This was a fool's game from the start, but Whyte believed it - that old woman made her believe it - and she is still making her do so. But from the short-sighted reality of the present, they were at a dead end. What else was there? Bond was dead, and Whyte was sure of it. There was no way he would have survived a poorly-executed shot, and falling into the water while suffering from the damage. The chances were slim to none, and Rachel Whyte was more than cynical to entertain another possibility. An empty, breathy laugh escaped her; the old woman couldn't be swayed.

"What is this?" Whyte inquired as soon as she recovered, as her eyes fell at a folder pinned underneath an open wine bottle on the woman's desk. The agent slid the file closer towards her and held it under the lamplight, noticing the familiar MI6 crest stamped on its paper brown surface. Her words were not for permission, of course, but a verbal statement of her curiosity. "This... This is a CV."

Her attention was met by an enlarged passport-sized photograph of a dark-haired man, pale and young with gradient-style glasses of black and clear plastic. Whyte eyed him for a moment, held by fascination and condescension. His credentials, on the other hand, was less of an entertaining read. Not because his skills were unimpressive, but because she literally could not read it at all. Thick black lines were drawn over his name, personal information, and other important aspects that she could have been interested in. The only solid piece of information in the folder was his photograph, and based on the layout of the document beside his picture, it was not hard to tell that it was some form of curriculum vitae. Rachel Whyte looked at the picture again, her mind taking wild guesses about his age. He couldn't be older than nineteen, or maybe not.

" _Was_ a CV." M corrected her, returning to the table. She held an unmarked disc in one hand, and a small brown envelope in the other. She placed the items on the surface of her closed laptop, and placed her hands upon the edges of the table as she remained standing, "That man is already hired."

Whyte gave her a look, then returned to the photograph, "As what? The MI6 paperboy? He can't be older than 20."

"He's 24 years old." the older woman replied, staring blankly at the folder in the agent's grasp. She anticipated her next move now that she had made her decision, and she knew that the best way to go from here was forward, "And he's your new quartermaster."

"You're joking." Whyte let out another huff, confusion on her face.

"When did I even humour you, 009?" M frowned in response, curving the wrinkled areas of her face. She directed her attention towards the disc and the small brown envelope, burying into her thoughts further before starting to place the disc inside, "He's excellent with computers. Best in his year, and the best across the British Isles. If we are to stay on top in this field, we have to step ahead. Our enemies are becoming smarter."

"Seven years." Whyte muttered, counting the numbers in her head. Seven years was the gap between her and this man, and to have achieved such a position so quickly made her think of his predecessor. The retired Q was a brilliant gunsmith and inventor, but he's not much with computers - at least not in manner this new one was supposed to be.

"You're the last person I thought to be so judgemental about age." the older woman arched a brow as she looked up slightly, sealing the the folder close with the disc secured inside, "You started young - trained young - as you have put it. You of all people should know, but then again, there's that arrogance of yours. That attitude can end you one day - one of the few reasons why I only send you out once in a while."

"I was already arrogant before you met me." the other woman dismissed, tossing the folder back on M's table as she took another sip from her cup. It may be closed now, but her eyes glazed at the stamped crest of the cover. The new quartermaster was a much younger man than the one before. He was different, at least looked like it. The agent's entitled sense of superiority told her to loathe him, "I was doing fine for the most part."

"Don't underestimate the abilities of your colleagues, 009. Your greatest allies are not always the people in the field." M looked at the agent as she responded, before placing the sealed brown envelope on top of the quartermaster's folder.

The appearance of the envelope interrupted their exchange, with Whyte's eyes darted towards the folder and M's hard expression becoming more unreadable as the seconds went by. The agent studied the old woman, then the folder, before returning to her again. Silent with curiosity, Whyte slowly slid the envelope towards her with her index finger before grasping it with two hands. Underneath the lamplight, the envelope was ordinary - padded within but the disc can be identified and felt. She flashed her eyes at M briefly, flipping the envelope over with her fingers. An address was written in M's cursive across the brown surface - to a London apartment not too far from the SIS building. The recipient's name was left blank.

"First a gunman, now a mail courier? You're taking me for granted now." Whyte scowled as she gazed up, waving the envelope with one hand. "My _exciting_ career with the MI6 has taken a new low."

M chose to ignore the agent's comment, and stuck with the plan that was drafted within her mind, "That name you gave me months ago... Is that still valid?"

"As long as that person is alive, that person is a valid and valued asset." Whyte shrugged, repetitively reading the London address that was scribbled on the envelope. She has seen it before, this place, it was hard to miss. "He... He doesn't like change. That man. When change happens, there's usually death to come along with it."

"Good." M's reply was short, accompanied by a small nod that reassured everything she had laid out. The agent, who had a sharp suspicion, eyed her with a raised brow. "You will send that envelope to 007 when the time comes, and you will know when that time is. Be discreet."

Whyte gripped on the envelope, sitting straighter from her lax position as things finally made sense. The disc - the name - she gaped right into M's eyes, and the old woman did not to say anything more because the answer was written across her face. Rachel Whyte's face slowly frowned, the shock vanishing from her. She understood now. "This is your plan, then, to die? This disc... It can kill you."

"You don't need a disc to die in this job, 009. If it is to die for my country, then it is my honoured duty. When I took this position, I made a decision. This comes with that decision, and if death is the end of it, and so it will be." M explained herself in a way anyone who worked under her expected her to, holding onto her dignity while betting on the thinner possibilities. "What, 009, are you now implying that after all these years of you trying to spite me... You actually care for my life?"

The agent looked away, the envelope still in tight within her grasp. She made no answer. The rain outside went on.

Acknowledging her silence, M took a deep breath and sat down onto her seat, "Time is of the essence. There are moles within the MI6, and I am aware of them. It won't be too long until they really find you out."

Whyte searched for the words she could not find, and instead of some remark, she found herself looking blankly upon M. The old woman, on the other hand, stayed firm like stone. Aloof, almost, as she began returning to her desk duties ignoring the grey eyes that trailed her. Every word was spoken so naturally, that the agent began to question why she herself felt some hesitation. M gave her word, and this - this envelope in her grasp - was that word. A simple order. Perhaps, the agent thought, that it was M's unusual optimism that felt so unnerving. This was not the M that she knew, or maybe, she did not know her at all.

"Cold, calculating... Right down to the numbers... That's what I liked about you, Olivia." Whyte spoke softly after a while, louder than a whisper. Her free hand opened towards the Royal Doulton Bulldog on the woman's desk, clasping the small sculpture around her fingers as she brought it to eye level, "But if there's any flaw to you, it's him. That Bond. Favouritism. To you, he's a machine - an animal like this bulldog - stubborn but hardy. Loyal. Sharp. But you don't even know if that bastard's even alive."

"The field agent that assisted him might have missed her shot, but the damage he endured should not be fatal." There was no trace of doubt in M's reply, even the doubt that made her write his obituary. She knew Whyte took the trouble to look for any form of breaking, and she refused to give the agent that satisfaction. Bond was alive, and she was more than sure of that now. "As far as we are concerned, 007 is still active and on duty. You shall attend to the matters we have discussed when he returns."

There was a clarity in her words that Whyte understood, but not necessarily accepted. The ceramic dog sculpture still rested upon her palm, daunting in appearance just like that bastard. A miserable expression took her, along with the memory of the time she accepted M's words to ring as true. The agent was not so sure anymore, for the old woman held onto her bias. What were the odds? She wondered quietly, impatient and cynical. She did not waste all these years for another gamble, but it seems as though it was the price of playing with fire.

"They're watching us, you and I, and our every move. This disc..." Whyte tapped a hand over the envelope that was now on her lap, sharing no eye contact with M. This was the key, Bond's most challenging task, the domino effect. "You're entrusting it to me. How are you so sure I wouldn't disappear? I can always leave you. Leave all this."

M took only a second to think about her words, "You can, but you won't. Because you know in yourself that this is the best choice you have. I win, you win."

A chuckle escaped the agent's breath, helpless in argument. Whyte placed the bulldog back on the desk, and rose slowly from her seat. Her pistol was back in her grasp, and the envelope now tucked into her inner coat pocket. "I'm leaving."

She stepped to the side and turned from the table, feeling her pocket for the presence of her cigarette box before grabbing her coffee cup from the floor. The agent moved abruptly, shuffling as she headed towards the closed glass doors of M's office. This was another useless gamble, and she had enough of it. But what M asked of her was not a request, and this envelope in her coat was an order underneath strict terms. When Whyte hastily opened the door, she was reminded of how she was bounded into these complications. M held her on a leash, and she allowed the old woman to do that. She cursed under her breath, pausing her movement as she held the door still.

Rachel Whyte had her head tilted down to the floor before looking up, swallowed by the darkness of the office before her. She clenched hard on her teeth as she tried to speak again, the small movements of her body telling of her uneasiness. A resentful tone broke from her, "Just make sure that he comes back."

"He doesn't have a choice."

* * *

 **A/N:** Thank you for reading the sixth chapter of Tessitura. Comments/reviews are appreciated. Your support keeps this story going, thank you.


	7. Paper Trails

**A/N: Always overwhelmed, and pleased with your comments, love, and follows for Tessitura. Please don't forget to comment/review this chapter, and I thank you very much for your support. For more updates, please visit my blog (link on profile).**

* * *

 **VI**

 **Paper Trails**

* * *

Q stared at the open toilet seat, his knees numb from kneeling, and one of his sleeves over his mouth. He took a deep breath, cursing, before looking up to the ceiling. Another deep breath. It was just a simple nap on his desk - the inevitable kind - from working around the clock, and with that came this mess. Q thought he had put it behind his mind, for he felt in control of himself for the past two months. Maybe, in the dreams he could not remember, it stayed there to haunt him. Today that was not the case, and it had returned like it never left. He sat on the floor for a moment, absorbed in the quiet, with a hand reaching for his glasses which laid beside him.

He couldn't seem to run away from it.

A soft buzz came from his pocket. It was his phone. Putting his glasses back on, Q took out the device and glossed over the screen as a small white box animated. Another one, the second for today, and exactly six hours apart and two different cities. Coordinates, two thumbnails of the location, and the police database it came from mapped before him - showing him everything he needed to know. When he narrowed down his findings to Volkov earlier, he had set up a program that infiltrated worldwide police databases to alert him of any crime that may be related to the assassin. He thought of everything - from weapons, to bullets, to style of death as factors that he should be alerted for. The MI6 database might be vague on what contributed to his end, but the records of his crimes were extensively detailed. There was no doubt that the MI6 had a maddening obsession with the man, which - at the thought of three dead Double-Os because of him - was more than understandable.

Standing slowly, the quartermaster dragged himself towards the sink and began rinsing his mouth as well as his hands. He gave the toilet a brief glance before flushing it, and started to wash his hands again but now with some speed. With another deep breath, he felt in control again. When he opened the locked door he was caught by surprise, "Good God, Patel!"

Kiran Patel, who jumped slightly at his reaction, tensed at his shoulders. He was an intelligence analyst who worked under Q, and one of the curated handful that worked within the Q-Branch. He looked at the quartermaster through his rimless glasses, "Sir."

Q fidgeted slightly, clearing his throat as he stood by the doorway of the toilet. His eyes wandered for a moment, speaking in broken words, "Are you... I suppose... The loo... Yes, of course."

Patel shook his head. "I was looking for you, sir. It's a rather urgent matter. We received a call from HM Treasury. They couldn't seem to contact your workshop, and so they called Q-Branch main."

He relaxed, the embarrassment now gone from his movements. There was a matter more important than his own, and the call itself was enough put him into place, "Treasury? What do they want?"

Q watched as Patel held out and operated his tablet with his peach-brown fingers, bringing up a PDF document detailing certain purchases that he had not seen before. These were invoices - invoices that came from flight bookings: Prague to Rome, and Rome to London. All in the same day. "Treasury called about the forms you didn't send along with these transactions, which they said were made about 40 hours ago."

"I haven't issued a plane ticket since-" Q stopped himself, closing his mouth and thought of better words. He had a suspicion, and he was going to confirm it. His eyes looked towards Patel's tablet, tapping a light finger on the surface, "No, investigate this transaction. Find out who, where, and the manner of doing so. Along with that, bring out any related CCTV footage you can find on the day of these flights and send them to me. I'll take care of Treasury."

Patel, aware of his orders, nodded and began walking towards the door leading to the Q-Branch section of the bunker. Q pressed the bridge of his nose over his frames, drawing a low breath as another problem fell on him. Bond was a case all by himself, and Q was only counting the minutes till Tanner or M would ring his desk and ask about the car. Then, there was Whyte. He didn't really know what to make of that woman, and his immediate thought of her prickled the spot on his cheek which she had kissed. But of course, the thought of Whyte was not without thinking of every moment she lied to him. The quartermaster hastily massaged his cheeks, aware that his face was red, before tugging uneasily at his collar to contain himself. He was reminded of Patel's leaving figure, and something occurred to him.

"Wait, Patel."

The analyst was about a metre away from the door before pausing, and turned in response to hearing his name, "Yes, sir?"

"You worked with Q - my predecessor - for quite a while, yes?" Q asked, moving up one side of his glasses. Now was the best of times to ask the question, for the coming hours and the days were making him pressed for time. He had two loose canons to chase. "After the everything was completely digitalised and stored into the server, what happened to those physical copies?"

Patel reflected for a moment, his tablet held at his side, "Yes, it was Johnson and I. We dealt with the archives, but it was more of her work to do. We were to burn the files instead of sending it back, and we did burn it. But the late M... I don't know if I should talk about this."

Q pressed his lips, he had to be firmer, "Any sensitive information, running through my servers or physically intact, are under my responsibility. That includes what the late M has ordered."

"Alright..." the analyst hesitated slightly, but nodded to himself eventually, "There was a select few she kept intact, she wanted them digitalised as well but they weren't to be uploaded on the MI6 server. She kept them, actually, and told us to hand in the physical versions to Tanner. With the work that we do, this was understood to not be questioned. On the report, we were to say that everything had burned."

It all made so much sense now, for Q had combed through every layer of the database and found nothing. Whatever it was that M decided to keep for herself, somewhere in those files were what he needed.

"Do you happen to remember what kind of information were in that select few?"

* * *

"I thought you'd be a little bit more punctual."

Eve Moneypenny smiled even when she said these words, her hands on each side of her hip under her open blue coat, and her heeled ankle boots clicking against the hard floor of the workshop. He was late, and they both knew that. It was his doing after all, this small meeting, one that he had arranged because he needed her help. Q only gave her an apologetic expression, closing the door behind him as he walked past her and toward his prototypes.

"My apologies, I was a bit... Interrupted. I received a call from Treasury, but nothing too bothersome." he muttered hastily, sorting the mess through his glances as he looked for something he couldn't find. Moneypenny was watchful, her clicking footsteps followed his own. "The place we are going to... What is it?"

Moneypenny looked around room, "I can't say. Not here. Too many ears. But I assure you, it's not dangerous."

Q briefly raised both of his brows at her last words, taking her assurance with little confidence as Whyte came into his mind again. Not too long after, he found what he was looking for - the SIG-Sauer P226, a gun he has been working on for agents inside and outside the Double-O program. He loaded the gun and offered it to the her, "You may say that, but I highly suggest you arm yourself. Between the two of us, you are more qualified to handle this weapon."

She gave him a doubtful glance before taking the SIG-Sauer from his grasp, "Alright, I'll take it - with the full assumption that you have written me, someone who is not a field agent anymore, a clearance to operate this gun."

"And you shall continue assuming so..." Q trailed as he moved to the corner by the bunker's door, reaching for his checkered black and blue blazer that hung on a makeshift hook, "...for the next few hours that we are out. Now, shall we?"

Moneypenny followed him with her eyes, fingers busy twirling the SIG-Sauer against her palm, her face rather amused. As they headed out of the door, Q wondered if it was because of something on his face or something from what he had said.

The security posted on the boat did not think much of their exit, and escorted them back to the main docks with little said apart from protocol. This was nothing beyond unusual, at least not in the plain eye, for Moneypenny and himself have travelled from place to place across London because of work-related obligations - at least the ones that required his physical presence. After she retired from field work and became a part of M's closer command, it brought them closer as colleagues as his work now stretched beyond what the previous Q used to do. Apart from weaponry and technology, he actively watched every form of virtual communication for M with Moneypenny working somewhere in the middle.

Q sat quietly as she drove the car over the bridge, his head turned towards the window as he observed the river at night. Being in constant commute, he never really had the leisure to see London the way it is at night. They were always just passageways - point A, point B.

"So," Moneypenny interrupted the silence, her dark eyes still on the road, "Do you not have something to tell me, Q?"

"And what is that?" he gave her a glance, his index finger holding his glasses in place as the car encountered a bump on the road.

She smiled as if he mocked her and amused her at the same time, and then checked her rearview mirror before speaking again, "Certain things. For example, why you asked me to keep quiet about certain things when Whyte woke up - subjects like Bond's theory about Oberhauser, the mere fact that Bond called asking about Oberhauser who is a dead man, and the amount of tracking you've tagged on Volkov's activities so you can watch him."

"Take it as a precaution." Q explained flatly, brushing his wavy hair away from his eyes, "Frankly, I don't know what to make of her. Do you remember that dead artist I showed you? Iosif Antonov? As I thought, she knew who he was. I wager she knows more than what she's letting on. Maybe not too much, but more than what we know."

"Do you suppose there's a connection with Volkov and Oberhauser? You did tell me that the Quantum agent that attacked you talked of Rome, and Bond was in Rome when he called me about Oberhauser." she asked, turning her head towards him for a moment as she turned the wheel to the approaching kerb and into a dark alley. "If not connected directly, it should be tied to an extent. I know for sure Bond suspects that Mr. White..."

"Precisely why I wanted to keep things from Whyte. Volkov seems interested in her, and she knows a shred of him. It's better to make it seem like we don't know so much. But we know, for a fact, that Oberhauser is dead, which makes this all a bother to solve..." he grumbled, as an image of Whyte and her snarky expressions drew itself in his mind, "This whole thing would be much easier, if we can grasp Bond properly. He 'killed' Volkov after all. But even with the Smart Blood, he's finding new ways to not to talk to us. The burner phone he gave you is a dead end now - deep into the water with the DB10."

"Did you expect anything less?"

Q rolled his eyes as the car stopped somewhere in the long dark road, "I may have held onto some optimism."

They got out of the car at the same time, with him being more curious about the surroundings than the place they stood in front of. It was as dark as he saw it from the car, but being outside immersed himself within it. There was little light coming from end to end, mostly coming from the city itself. They were somewhere in East London, and as Q expected when he finally looked to where Moneypenny went, he was standing in front of a rather ordinary warehouse with no doubt containing very extraordinary things.

"He was right." Q said quietly, reminded of what Patel had told him, "They really got a bloody warehouse in East London."

Moneypenny stood by a booth-like window by the door, which only showed itself when she rolled up the inconspicuous door that resembled the wall. She looked over her shoulder as she pulled out a keycard from her pocket, hearing the words he said, "You knew about thdis place?"

"I may have had some conversations, but apparently even they don't know what's going on. All they knew is that they were files that the late M wanted to keep, badly. The sort that are not uploaded in my servers." he shrugged, walking till he stood behind her and looked around again. A newfound instinct, he supposed. "But don't you think this is rather a place too obvious to store important things?"

"That's why it's under a civilian's name. The ghost kind, one that only exists in papers and does not link back to MI6 - which explains the minimal security." Moneypenny explained as the lights in the booth turned green, and the doors unlocked open, "Besides, with all the warehouses in this neighbourhood, they'll all just think we're a lot of deranged artists trying to matter."

"How very comforting."

The interior was smaller than it looked and clinically lit, with a short and narrow hallway leading to a small area with a fully-equipped office desk sitting in-between two closed keycard-operated doors. Q supposed it was a makeshift front desk, as this warehouse took more of an appearance of an isolated storage vault. If these were secrets all the Ms of MI6 would bury to their grave, the security measures made sense. Moneypenny walked ahead of him as he followed, his eyes looking up the at the walls counting every CCTV camera that moved its eye to track their movement. These were different models than the ones from the office and the bunker, but he was not foreign to them. He had ordered the same ones to guard his servers.

"Why do you know of this place, Moneypenny?" Q whispered to her, but despite his lowered voice, it echoed softly much to his displeasure.

"I suppose comes with the job." Moneypenny answered, waving a hand slightly as they walked short hallway, "Every person who becomes M knows of this place, but using it is entirely up to their liking. Despite my position, M had some confidence I could keep this a secret and told me of the place. After Volkov and the Oberhauser situation, I thought to take you here after M had told us about Bond killing Volkov. It might not be on your servers, but I am sure we'll finding something here."

"Do you think-"

She stopped abruptly and held her hand up to silence him. Q knew where his place was and stood still, understanding her gesture perfectly as he watched the SIG-Sauer surface from her coat pocket. They proceeded slowly, with Moneypenny leading the way as she slowly peered out of the narrow hallway and into the space where the makeshift front desk stood. She signalled Q to a halt, spinning on her heels as she pointed the SIG-Sauer left and right towards the hidden corners hiding behind the hallway. When she was assured that it was only them in this part of the room, she raised her hand at Q again, confirming that it was clear. But despite the silence, Moneypenny had her guard on steady with sharp eyes that could pierce the walls that surrounded them.

"Something's not right." she whispered to him, her eyes darted at the hallway with Q standing behind her. She gripped on the gun tightly with both hands, preparing for anything, "There should be someone here."

Q's eyes fell to the computer on the desk as he looked around, and an idea occurred to him, "I think we may have an answer to that."

He circled the table, mindful of his footsteps, before slipping into the empty seat and tapping twice on the keyboard's spacebar. The computer came to life shortly, with the MI6 logo stamped in the middle of the screen with no windows nor textboxes. Q raised a quizzical brow, typing a series of keys that opened a series of black boxes riddled with things only he could understand, "Huh, so this is where this went."

Moneypenny glanced over her shoulder, "Something wrong?"

"No, everything is perfect." Q shook his head, the windows reflecting against his glasses as his eyes scrolled back and fort the screen. "This... This security system is mine. I designed this."

"You did?"

"A year ago when I applied for this position, they required us to design a security system that is to be attached to the CV. I designed mine with Artificial Intelligence in mind, for human integrity can only go so far. The idea of this system is to be taught, the more attacks it knows, the better it will be in detecting and tightening security measures. Self-capable." he pressed a button on the keyboard and waited, a finger tapped idly against the keys as he watched his own program attempt to defeat him. When he found his chance, he began typing again, "Fortunately for us, I did place some measures of my own just in case they decided to steal my idea without hiring me - do these two doors need the both keycards to open the both doors?"

"You need both for the door on the right. That's where the storage is. Left is a break room of sorts for stationed agents, and only requires one keycard. Storage needs both the authorised ID of the staff and the stationed agent swiped at the same time." Moneypenny answered him, eyeing the CCTV at the corner which was directed towards the table behind her where Q sat with focus, "Hurry, Q. I don't like this."

"We're in." Q announced just as promptly, pressing the 'Enter' key as the door on the right side of the room clicked to unlock at his bidding. After he had penetrated the system, a grid-like footage surfaced into the monitor as he took control, "Now pulling up all bloody the CCTVs in this place to see what is going on - and we have company. There's someone in there Moneypenny, a few shelves down by the door and he's armed with a gun. We have an agent down 3 o' clock from the entrance, but I reckon if he's dead."

She took a deep breath, glancing at him then at the door, "I'm going in."

He felt his fists clench briefly, but forced them to rest on the keyboard to maintain composure, "Alright. I'll see what I can salvage from this computer, and why it's not integrated into the main."

Moneypenny nodded as she pressed her shoulder against the doorframe of the right door, the SIG-Sauer tight in her grasp as she slowly pushed on the knob so it made little to no sound. Q tried his best to focus on his part of the duties, but his heart pounded harder than ever. He just narrowly escaped death less than 24 hours ago, and now once again, he has found himself in a similar situation that he may or may not escape from. But his desire for answers filled him and he could not find himself going back, if this place had the answers, he had to know. There are secrets within the agency that wished to stay hidden, but knowing them might be their best shot. He just has to assure himself that this Quantum agent or whoever this armed person was, is someone who would be very easily defeated.

As soon as she entered the storage, gunfire was exchanged almost immediately. Q slid down his seat at the sound, partly from instinct and partly with fear. He cleared his throat as he sat back up again, pulling on his shirt as he motioned himself to focus. From the slightly ajar door, he heard Moneypenny's voice followed by the sound of collapsing metal shelves. He kept the CCTV watching them lingering at the corner of the screen, but refused to look at it completely. A few clicks and keys later, he began searching through every part of the computer. None resembled or were the digitised files that Patel talked about that the late M had kept, but there was a diligent collection of CCTV footages, file inventory of everything in the storage, and security logs pertaining to visits to this facility. Q felt his eyes widen.

 _ **Oct.6.2015-08:00-Eve Moneypenny**_

 _ **Oct.6.2015-08:01-Garreth Mallory**_

 _ **Nov.2.2015-21:45-Rachel Whyte**_

 _ **Nov.3.2015-14:31-Bill Tanner**_

 _ **Nov.10.2015-15:22-Rachel Whyte**_

Another round of gunfire ensued in the storage, but Q had his eyes planted on the last day Whyte walked in this place. The 10th was yesterday, a few hours before the opera and the mess that was now at the present. Q felt himself frown, grabbing onto the mouse as he clicked and scrolled into these two logs to investigate. What was Whyte doing here? She knew about this place as well?

 _ **Nov.2.2015**_

 _ **REASON: CLASSIFIED. Authorised by O.M (see letter). Granted access by A. Coulson.**_

 _ **Nov.10.2015**_

 _ **REASON: CLASSIFIED. Authorised by O.M (see letter). Granted access by P. Gilder.**_

He closed the windows and opened the PDF file attached to the folder under Whyte's name and logs, revealing the digital letter mentioned in the logs. It was an official MI6 letter signed with the late M's signature, accompanied by words granting full authorisation for Whyte to have the power to access every part of the storage. Instead of answers, Q became more curious and also confused. Why would the late M grant her such access to a place with such confidential and crucial information? He thought about it for a moment before hovering his hand over the mouse, only to find a thread of his sweater hooked on the edge of a glossy-looking sheet of paper tucked underneath the keyboard.

Curious, Q moved the keyboard to the side and looked at the paper more closely. It was a flyer from the Saatchi Gallery with a black-and-white picture of a young boy, his camouflaged by myriad of vibrantly-coloured paint tracing curves that covered him like a mask. The piece was enlarged across the whole flyer, and a band of black laid over the picture decorated with clean white text that wrote:

 _ **'In His Eyes, Through My Eyes': A Synthesis of Two Mediums  
**_ **a travelling exhibit featuring the works of the late Iosif Antonov  
** **Curated by Vera Antonov  
** **November 8-15, 2015**

Q held the flyer higher up to the light, confirming to himself that his eyes and his mind were not melding reality with his investigations with Moneypenny. But there was no mistake, Antonov... Antonov... Two Antonovs, and this Vera could be his sister or some relative. It might be slim, but he wondered if she had some answers that he could hold on to. Slipping the flyer into his pocket, Q heard one more gunshot fire after the brief silence from seconds ago. He heard Moneypenny gasp outloud from the doorway, and he took one more look at the screen before dragging his feet to the storage. Q hesitated for a moment as he wrapped his cold fingers around the doorknob, knowing he was well under qualified to do anything as taxing as field agent work. But he focused his thoughts on the Moneypenny who was just behind the door, and her efforts to help him come this far. Q swallowed harder.

"It's clear, Q!" he heard Moneypenny sigh in her own relief, and a gun dropping to the ground was sound, "But Coulson... He... He's..."

He opened the door with the courage he did not have before, and found Moneypenny on the ground leaning on one of the shelves. Her shoes and ankles were covered in the blood from the two men that lay dead at her feet, with one of them being that A. Coulson - the agent from the logs. He felt his hand twitch at the sight before him, but quickly hid this reaction as he dug into his pockets. He walked over slowly to Moneypenny's side, examining the bodies as he went. The other man, the intruder who killed Coulson, was not an unfamiliar face. In fact, he was also an MI6 agent.

"Are you going to be alright?" Q muttered lowly, bending slightly to help her back to her feet. Moneypenny struggled slightly, but thanked him as soon as they stood together properly. They looked at the bodies again.

"I will be." she breathed, still shaken as she rubbed her neck uneasily with stained hands, "But the intruder... He's one of us. He's an agent, I knew him I... We... We trained together and he killed Coulson..."

"I-I gathered as much." he stammered in agreement, but he wondered how long the dead agent had been a mole, "I suppose he's with Quantum as well. Whatever is in here... Whyte knows about it, and our late M gave her some jurisdiction."

"What? Why would M...?"

Q shook his head, pressing his fingers just at the bridge of this nose, "The logs are too vague, but there's an inventory in the computer that has a record of the files in this place. The network drive is not one I'm familiar with, but I'm more than certain it is not leeching off of my servers. I'll have to get someone we can trust - maybe Patel - to find the colo and see what else this server is hiding."

"While he works on that, I shall see what I can find here." Moneypenny nodded as she straightened herself, the events that had just occurred started to fade away from her face, "I'll... I'll take you back to the bunker, and I'll take care of this. I know we should be doing this together, but you have to try and find Bond and get him talking. He has an answer, maybe clearer than this mess. This is bigger than all of us, and I think this is the best I could do for Coulson."

* * *

It was the call.

Q bit on his lip as he watched his phone screen come to life through rhythmic vibrations, his hands sweating as he meticulously cleaned the SIG-Sauer that Moneypenny used earlier piece by piece. M's name flashed aggressively on the screen, and he felt his chest pound to the point that it could pierce him. The Tokyo meeting was most likely over, and Tanner has finally had the luxury to read all the emails about the DB10. It was a call that he had to answer, and as he placed the equipment down, Q picked up his phone from the table and clenched his jaws together as he greeted M on the phone with all the composure he could muster.

"Yes, sir." he immediately said as he pressed the button, textbook in greeting.

 _"Please tell me 007 is in London."_ M was blunt as always, but even when Q thought he had prepared himself for his question, he did not feel ready at all.

"Oh, yes." Q quickly responded, hoping that it was fast enough that M wouldn't notice any form of hesitation. The man was a veteran when it came to spotting cheap lies. He tracked Bond almost immediately after Moneypenny took him back to the bunker, and he was nowhere near Rome. "Um... I'll... I'll just take a look now, sir."

 _"Because if he isn't, you're in deep shit. You have precisely 10 seconds."_

Q laughed nervously, more for himself and less for show. He had to calm down.

With one shoulder holding the phone for support, he headed towards the room he dedicated to Smart Blood tracking with one of his tablets in hand. It was a small room tucked somewhere between Q-Branch and his workshop, where an array of large screens tracking all active Double-Os as they moved about their missions. He lowered his gaze briefly and tapped a series of commands on the small screen, and watched the large screens do their work across a giant digital map. The map narrowed itself to a region of Europe, but nowhere in the place Q saw him before. He felt his blood run colder as it slowly narrowed Bond's location, which is becoming further and further away from comfort:

 _ **Altaussee, Austria  
**_ _ **Agent: 007**_

"I have him, sir." Q persevered to keep his voice steady, the tablet shaking in his hand as a larger lie escaped his lips. All for the sake of a word, Bond's word. A favour he could not refuse. "He appears to be in Chelsea."

 _"Well, I want eyes on him when I get back. Understood?"_

He felt his heart pound again, digging himself deeper into his own grave, "I completely understand... Sir."

When M hung up on his end of the line, Q took a long and lasting breath. From the exhaustion of those simple minutes, it felt more like a hard gasp. What in the world is 007 thinking? Not even all the Smart Blood running in that man's veins will let Q know what truly is on his mind, and this consistent betrayals he has been doing to M has been taking its toll on him the longer this goes on. He brushed his fingers across the hair over his eyes, taking another deep breath to keep away the nauseating feeling that stirred him.

As he was about to leave, his tablet beeped twice a row in notification. When Q looked up the screen, a new dot formed kilometres apart from Bond's:

 _ **Altaussee, Austria  
**_ _ **Agent: 009**_

Before he could react accordingly, his phone rang again, but it was not M. He glanced at his phone, then at the screen, and then back to his phone again. It was a blocked number. Whoever it may be, he had to answer it. Q received the call by pressing the button on the screen, placing the phone over his ear with his eyes glazed on Rachel Whyte's Double-O number.

 _"Why hello, Q."_


	8. A Rabbit Box

**A/N:** Thank you for all the recent follows, the love, and the reviews for Tessitura. You are all cherished and very much appreciated.

* * *

 **VIII**

 **A Rabbit Box**

* * *

Altaussee, Austria

 _"...Whyte?"_

The agent's lips curved slightly at the sound of her name, her eye peeking into the scope of her sniper as she followed the figure of a middle-aged man who stood outside his winter lodge. It was one of many yet generously distant winter cabins across the spread of white, blessed with both peace and calming isolation by the Austrian winter. Because of the narrow timeframe she has been given with, she only had little time to scout her surroundings and observe her target. Rachel Whyte was not one to refuse a challenge, but having so little time to prepare for something a little more on the higher profile had its own headaches. It irked her, but these days, almost everything did.

"The one and only." she replied casually, but from what she was hearing on the earpiece, Q was having a harder time in the conversation. "It's a blocked call, yet you just knew. Have you missed me so much?"

She heard him clear his throat awkwardly, _"...Where are you?"_

"I don't know either." Whyte spoke thoughtfully, moving her eye away from the scope then returning to it once more. She positioned herself more firmly as she lay flat on the cold snow, her hand over the trigger as she held her breath to a steady, "But I do think I'm home."

With her finger hooked over the trigger, Whyte pulled and took her shot with the gun. The rifle cracked a small sound as the bullet swam across the thick of winter wind, diving its long form into the man's forehead. It pierced his skull as it passed, exiting into the other side of his head before hitting the wooden wall behind him. The man collapsed into his quiet death, toppling over the railings of his porch balcony falling face down; the snow stained red by his blood. Whyte watched it unfold through her scope, promising herself the complete assurance which is the perfection of her shot. She pulled on the bolt handle to discharge the spent cartridge shell, before taking a moment to look around her. The radius was a comfortable distance, but as lonely as this place seemed, Whyte knew she still had to make sure.

 _"Right, home..."_ Q agreed, but sounded more like he was assuring himself. She had a silencer on her rifle, but she only hoped his worries took his mind away from whatever sound was left. _"Where else would you be..."_

"It may not be obvious, but I am a homebody at heart." Whyte added to his thoughts, slipping off the white blanket she had draped over her as she slowly rose from her spot. She slung the sniper rifle on her back, and dusted the snow off her leather-lined jacket with a gloved hand. The winter wind stung where she stood, and being in such a state made her immediately miss the gloomy, wet, London breeze.

A mild buzz nudged at the agent's wrist, and she glared at her sleeve before she reluctantly rolled the thick layers back to see her watch screen come to life. A black square filled the tiny computer screen, as a simple message drew itself for her to read:

 _Time is up. I hope you have done our little favour in due time._

 _I expect you have found Mr. Hinx to be something of use._

Whyte rolled her eyes at the garbage Oberhauser took the time to write, knowing well that the man knew working alone was her ethic. Mr. Hinx was presented as a courtesy, but in reality, his presence was Oberhauser's form of insurance. That man will never trust her, and she couldn't blame him after everything that's happened. Q's voice droned on as she read the message again, saying lines that bordered between assuring himself and poor attempts of casual conversation. Whyte rolled her sleeve back and pulled over her fur-lined hood, deciding to ignore the message as she pulled out her MK 23 MOD 0 pistol from the inner pocket of her coat.

Q sighed from the other line, most likely realising her lack of attention. They were going in circles, and they were both aware of the fact, " _The hell are you doing there, 009?_ "

"Photography. You know, shooting people." she replied, feigning ignorance to the connotation of his question, her free hand fishing for a cigarette tucked in the inner breast pocket of her coat. Winter wear was comfortable, but the layers can be nuisance.

" _Photography..._ ** _Photography_** _..._ "

After several attempts of lighting the stick, Whyte threw the cigarette into the snow with heightened irritation. She cursed to herself, visibly frustrated as she stomped her boot over the patch of snow in which where she buried the cigarette. Q dragged on with his own spells over her ear, but the situation at hand made her very good at tuning him out of her current interest. She raised the MOD 0 to her eye level, examining it carefully before scowling at the obvious and excessive addition of a laser aiming module. Oberhauser was fooling around with her equipment, and despite this charade being played on his 'exclusive terms', Whyte will take her liberties.

"Is it so strange to have a hobby, Q?" she said after a moment, pinching the module with two fingers and slid it off the the gun. Whyte gave it one last look, sneering at the extent of how much of a Oberhauser wanted to frustrate her. They played a game, the two of them, but she knew he would be a little more petty.

Lifting the boot that buried the failed cigarette, she tossed the module at the same exact place but crushed it more firmly with the solid-toothed heel of her boot. When a satisfying crack was heard, Whyte lowered the gun but held it more firmly; her other hand tugging lightly at the strap at kept the sniper rifle latched onto her back. As she hiked further away from her shooting position, the long dark form that was the watchful figure of Mr. Hinx became more apparent. The black-clad, monolithic form of Mr. Hinx became larger as the distance narrowed. A few kilometres back in a well-established position, she could have shot this oaf dead if she wanted. She did not like him, not at all. But she had her loyalties with Oberhauser, and she was willing to hold off killing Mr. Hinx until she felt like she earned enough to misbehave. She slowed her pace relatively, aware of Q still being on the line, watching Mr. Hinx who looked far into the distance.

" _Only if it's you._ "

There was something in the way he said it that made Whyte smile weakly, especially like a fool considering her situation. She began taking each of her steps with time and leisure, her grey gaze watchful of Mr. Hinx, "If you're flirting right now, then I must tell you that you're succeeding."

" _I -_ _What are you-_ " the quartermaster stopped himself as he cleared his throat, inevitably caught off guard by her words. She could almost imagine him tugging at his clothes nervously, something that seemed almost like a habit that happened because of her, " _You are not being straightforward, 009. Will you stop avoiding my question? Are you... Perhaps... With someone?_ "

Her brows furrowed, curious, "Should I play the guessing game with you, or do you know something that I don't?"

" _Well!_ " he reasoned, but his voice stammered and became breathy against her earpiece. Q was many things, but being an efficient liar was not one of them. Whyte knew she had caught onto something, " _I was simply under assumption. You did say you were home, and you are being a little... Dodgy._ "

Just as when she was about to inquire who this 'someone' might be, Mr. Hinx's distant eyes turned to her direction, seemingly more than aware of how long she had been staring at him. He did not move much, but she knew she was now obligated to walk a few paces faster. Whyte pursed her lips, her eyes directing slightly to the side where the earpiece was attached. She readjusted the rifle strap again, holding it more firmly as she stomped along the thick snow with her boots. It was easy to tell that this was not the 'rabbit box' Oberhauser was referring to back at her living room, and knowing how he is with his words, it may be a little bit more figurative than she imagined.

"Come off it, Q. We both know I'm not in London." she whispered to him, lowering her voice as she brought a gloved hand up to the earpiece and ended the call before he could react. Mr. Hinx was a few steps away, still watchful. "Bugger."

When she reached him, they stood at a comfortable distance. He was a man of few words, choosing to speak more with his gun than his mouth. The behaviour irritated Whyte more than she thought, because with his role as a 'guardian' of sorts, he was not very useful in anything else than visibly threatening her. It was during these moments in the few hours that they are together that made her wish she had taken the chance of shooting him. She glared at him for a few moments to compete with his beady black gaze, before shrugging him off completely - choosing to walk past him and towards the path where Range Rover was parked. Any moment from now, Oberhauser will send her another patch of instructions, and she can only hope that this time it was the 'rabbit box'.

The agent was stopped with what seemed to be a black, solid, cylindrical object pushed firmly against her chest by one of Mr. Hinx's large arms. Whyte shot him another glare, but he only pushed it further to drag her into a backwards motion until she was in front of him, "Alright! Alright! What is it you want? What is this? We're not exactly running a relay here, are we?"

Mr. Hinx held up the cylinder to show her the entirety of the cylinder which was, now that she finally saw it, emitting a glowing blue light from a rectangular lengthwise slit marked in the middle. He began speaking in his deep gruff voice, "The client wishes to have a bioscan of the corpse. For proof."

Whyte eyed the cylinder, now revealed to be a portable 'bioscanner', spitefully, "What do you take me for? Only a fool would go back to the scene of crime unless it's part of the process, and as to my knowledge, I'm only here to have his head shot."

"The client wants a bioscan." Mr Hinx said more firmly, now with the intention to intimidate her. It may have worked once back in London, but they were of equal advantage now - and well armed.

She folded her arms, defiant, "Do it, then. Franz told me you are to be useful to me, yet all you have done is to stand there straighter than a tree - all piss and wind, really."

A growl escaped the burly man, wishing to attack her but restrained by his own orders. He lowered the bioscanner, but gripped it tightly. He threw her a venomous look, which lasted even after he finally turned away and grudgingly dug his thick, muscular legs through the snow as he made his way to the cabin. Whyte turned herself to watch him, arms still crossed but now with the triumphant smirk on her face. It was through the Oberhauser's orders that they have found this bitter civility, and as unpleasant as it was, it was definitely something bearable. But most of all, who was this certain client? How is he so pompous to even demand a bioscan of his own victim? It felt pretentious. A dead body is a dead body, and an assurance from her is worth more than anything. Yet, this client felt otherwise and it insulted her ego.

Whyte made her way on the path where they parked the Range Rover, which was a few kilometres away from the site. Although she has a dislike for him, Mr. Hinx was bearable compared to the Quantum agents who would aggressively trailed her way. They had their uses, but one bothersome brute was more bearable than a cluster of agents hiding in the dark. All this work and all this stalling with clients on the side was making her impatient, and all she wanted was to get a move onto the next and bigger prospect.

A half hour later she reached the Range Rover, sinister in black and dusted with speckles of snow falling from the dead trees that camouflaged it from ordinary sight. Whyte looked around, wary by nature, pulling on the handle of the door leading to the passenger seat before seating herself in the wait. The clever Mr. Hinx kept the keys to himself, but Whyte had no plans to escape him. She wished to shoot him dead, yes, but escaping was not part of the picture. She simply hated chaperones.

She pulled off her hood, revealing the chaos of bright wavy blonde hair popping against the dark leather lining. Her watch vibrated softly under the layers, indicating that someone was calling her. Whyte rolled her sleeve lightly, familiar with the numbers scribbled on the small screen, "Finally."

A gloved finger found the button on her earpiece.

" _Are you ready?_ " Franz Oberhauser's voice chimed into her ear, rolling the words in his peculiar accent. There was a hint of impatience in his voice.

"I am in the wait until your little pet finishes the bioscan." Whyte responded promptly, leaning back on the premium seats as she placed the sniper rifle standing between her legs. She dragged her eyes across the landscape, unamused with the eery quiet, "Who is this client? I don't like him already. A bioscan! Really, now..."

" _Now, now, my dear. You have been gone a long time, occupied with... Other interests._ " Oberhauser tried to assure her, but she only shrugged silently, " _The client just wants the assurance that you are, eh, still as efficient as advertised._ "

"I don't like being mocked, Franz."

" _You don't have to be, Rachel. The chopper will arrive in 2._ "

"Just what are you on about?"

Her question was answered in perfect timing, as a gunmetal black helicopter of intelligent design swooped down elegantly right before her eyes. She held tightly to her weapons by reflex, ducking down from her seat as she observed the aircraft carefully. It was no ordinary helicopter, but Spectre was no ordinary group. From first glance, Whyte thought it was army technology, but the exquisite aerodynamic curves and the fragmented fashion of the glass shield made her think otherwise. The helicopter was beautiful, it looked armoured and it was armoured, and - as she stared at it longer - its shiny build seemed to reflect against the snow and absorbing its image. A dynamic, mirror-like camouflage.

On the right of the aircraft, Mr. Hinx's large figure surfaced slowly from the inclining hike up to the surface. His eyes were fixed on the helicopter, understanding more of the situation than she did. But at this point, Whyte was no longer watching from within the Range Rover. Out of her own caution, and out of her intrinsic suspicion of Oberhauser's words, she took advantage of the arrival to slip out into one of her vantage points located within the proximity. Shortly after they parked the vehicle, she made notes in her head about possible vantage points. It was a rush estimate, and in a more delicate situation, she would have assessed these preparations further. Spectre gave her such little time, and so did the MI6. They simply do not understand what made her work better.

Peering through the scope of the rifle, she continued to watch the scene unfold with her trigger at the ready. A vertical, rectangular outline popped out of the smooth surface of the black helicopter and slid open slowly - producing two security personnel in black parkas whom arranged themselves to stand on each side of the opening. Their faces were blank and their gaze seemed empty, both armed with a full-autos. Followed by these assumed-goons was a tall man refined by his stature, and from the fitted silhouette of his dark-olive shearling peacoat, Whyte could tell that he was built to some degree. He stood there, still, looking up as if inhaling the winter with his brown hair brushing aggressively against his face; his two bodyguards unblinking.

"Where is she, Mr. Hinx?" he asked, still keeping his position, while his two bodyguards rotated to the burly man's direction at the same time. Her earpiece doubled as a long-range hearing device, which made her careful watching easier. Yet even so, she couldn't help but feel slightly uncomfortable with how synchronised his bodyguards were. It felt almost abnormal, mechanical.

Whyte moved her scope to Mr. Hinx, whose gaze directed itself at the open door of the Range Rover. He was not impressed and grumbled under his breath, and the man in the shearling peacoat understood as much. He nodded to himself, taking his eyes away from Mr. Hinx as he rolled up his sleeve to reveal his wrist. A few seconds pass, and Whyte felt her watch buzz softly. Reluctantly taking her eyes off of her scope, she rolled up her sleeve, revealing a message from a blocked number:

 _Don't you want to see the rabbit box?_

The agent eyed into her scope again, and saw the man in the shearling peacoat looking around the open with a satisfied smile on his face. He reached inside his sleeves and revealed his pistol, throwing it metres away from his grasp before holding his hands up high; his brown hair blown across his face, "I'm ready when you are, Ms. Whyte."

Oberhauser will make another call if she took too long, and even if it stirred her the wrong way, she had to trust this obvious prick. There was no doubt that he was the client, and she did not like meeting clients. Time, however, is fickle. Quickly, and in chained reaction, Whyte took aim and cleanly shot his two bodyguards that stood behind him before rising slowly from her position. Mr. Hinx raised his firearm at the ready, but the man in the shearling peacoat raised his gloved hand as he started laughing hysterically, maniacally. He took amusement in the death of his men, now shivering back and forth against the helicopter. When he turned once again into the open, Rachel Whyte stood by the front of the Range Rover, unwrapped from her hood and her ski mask with the MOD 0 in her grasp. Like a ghost in the wind.

"Well, if it isn't the woman herself." the man in the peacoat proclaimed with some excitement, eyeing her up and down with invested interest. Mr. Hinx grumbled at the side, the bioscanner still in his grasp. "You are just like what they say. Jakob Albrecht, your not-so-chaffeur."

"Albrecht Technologies being involved in a worldwide criminal syndicate hardly surprises me." Whyte rolled her eyes, silently wondering how she had not picked it up all this time. The helicopter itself was a telltale sign. She did not read enough of the news to be familiar with his face.

"Oh, no no. I am not the client, and I am not part of this... _Thing_ , either. Think of me as a friend, with some favours here and there. Ah, which reminds me, the bioscan?" Albrecht spoke in an accent that straddled German and American, turning towards the moving figure of Mr. Hinx who placed the cylindrical object on his grasp, "State-of-the-art, and a prototype. Your client is a friend, when they told me about this... _Job_ , I thought it would be a perfect time to test this little precious before I launch it to market. Imagine all the world government money flowing in! Access to a person's biology through interactive, projected, three-dimensional reality."

He spoke too much for her liking, that the agent's eyes instead watched the two men she had previously shot. They were shivering when they should have been dead, it was a strange and disturbing sight, "Why are they doing that?"

"What? Oh. _Them_. That is just brain implant malfunction, they are wearing prototypes that allow me to control them. Organic, improved drones powered by neuro-nanotechnologies. Still in the works. They have never been shot in such a way before, and I am assuming they are experiencing some electrocution from the bullet damage. Nothing to worry about, just more room for improvement." Albrecht remarked calmly, waving a hand to dismiss his dying men as he pocketed the bioscanner. He pulled out a black box from his coat and opened it, revealing a luxurious set of black cigarettes with gold-coloured filters, "Before I take you to your destination, may I interest you with a cigarette?"

She stared at his offer, maybe a little more than she should have. Remembering her failed attempt earlier, this was a hard offer to refuse even from a man like him. Looking to Mr. Hinx, then to Albrecht, Whyte moved slowly across the snow and reached into his open box for a stick. The man smiled, appearing fascinated that she took him for his offering, and proceeded to light it for her with his zippo lighter. The frustration of earlier disappeared slowly, and her mood slightly unhinged. Unknown to her, Albrecht watched this unfold as he pocketed his lighter, a misplaced smile on his face.

"I see you are a smoker too." he said after a moment, cutting her peace from the moment.

"Only when I am vexed."

"Then," Albrecht thought about it for a moment as Whyte pulled her hood over her head, while Mr. Hinx gestured for her to board the helicopter with him. He smiled again, widely, like he knew a secret that only the both of them understood, "Am I vexing you?"

The agent gave him a blank look, "No, you just happened happened to have a pack of Sobranies."

She moved past him and into the aircraft, a stupid grin still on the man's face. He was a strange one, with strange interests. But Rachel Whyte was beyond entertaining him, client or not, this whole arrangement is still beyond her work ethic, and Oberhauser isn't so keen in letting her work alone yet. It will take time, but she had to swallow the excessiveness of all of this. Everything would be much quicker, easier, if the people above her did not insist to chaperone her like a child. She thought about the things that Q hinted to her earlier, and it was all she could think about.

* * *

 _When we meet again, Rachel Whyte,_

 _I hope you wouldn't be so stubborn with me._

Whatever it was Jakob Albrecht was expecting from their encounter, Whyte couldn't care less and his audacity to send her such message ensured she shouldn't care at all. She rolled her sleeve over her watch, regretting the wasted time she spend reading the message. Oberhauser's 'rabbit box', was a two-storey wooden house in the middle of nowhere. It was a structure that stood between the lake and the unpredictable wilderness, with an appearance of abandonment than a formidable rest-house. Albrecht's helicopter dropped them within the proximity, but she and Mr. Hinx had to hike the rest of the way.

When they were about a few hundred metres away from the house, Mr. Hinx raised a large arm to put her to a halt, its abruptness took her off her guard. "What is it now, you big brute?"

"The door is open." he told her, looking slightly over his shoulder without any effort to meet her gaze. Whyte glared at him for a moment, and then at the door ajar before pulling out the MOD 0.

Mr. Hinx followed suit, his pistol at the ready as they cautiously approached the decaying porch, wary of their footsteps. It was no use worrying about footsteps, their presence will be known either way, and preparation mattered more than the quantity of people present. Whyte eyed the doorway and traced her gaze from the door and the snow, observing the markings left by an obvious trail that came from the docks. One person, she noted to herself. One person led himself either in or out the house, and should that be an intruder or the owner was another story. Open doors are as misleading as they are telling.

"Male, likely built, and perhaps with a vengeance." Whyte commented as she placed her boot over the intruder's trail on the snow, adding that last bit for her own humour.

Mr. Hinx raised a brow, not expecting her input with the situation, "It is just a footprint."

The agent gave him a condescending look, brushing around his large figure, one hand on the ajar door and the other holding her pistol, "This is clearly why you're the thug, and I am the professional. Cover me."

The man hissed lowly but said nothing, and from the heavy footsteps the followed her, Whyte knew she had his cooperation. As they stepped into the poor excuse of a home, the place felt barren despite all the furniture that tried to simulate a lived-in home. There was little to no light to be found, with walls and corners defined by shadows and the bleeding trails of light caused by the reflection of the snow outside. This was the rabbit box, but who was the rabbit? Why is it, that of all places, Franz thought it would be something that she would look forward to? Whyte kept these thoughts to herself, gesturing a hand sign to Mr. Hinx with the suggestion to split and look around. He simply nodded, disappearing slowly into the corridor that led to a staircase - a place with undoubtedly more light.

Despite it being her plan to divide and conquer, Rachel Whyte found herself fascinated with the living room. It has the illusion of life, yet to her - seeing all the dust that has gathered - it seems to have tried preserving a point in time. An immortalisation of a moment, a forgotten relic of the past. Just at the top corner above the curtains, almost unnoticed to an unwatchful eye, was a blinking red dot that belonged to a security camera mounted against the wall. Textbook. She simpered at the sight, ignoring the camera after giving it her attention, grabbing a gold-plated picture frame on top of the dead fireplace. It was a portrait of a family of three, and not a very recent one. The husband had a long face with a young and sharp gaze, his wife was demure and brunette with some sophistication, and their pleased young daughter with yellow blonde hair. It was an ordinary photo, but Whyte didn't care too much about the family - she had her attention at the husband. His face... She had seen this face before.

"Whyte." echoed Mr. Hinx somewhere in the house, booming. She looked away from the picture frame, tracking where his voice came from with his eyes. "Kitchen."

The agent looked down at the picture frame on her hand, squinting her eyes at the man one last time before tossing the frame onto the dusty sofa. She held the MOD 0 with both hands, still mindful of precaution as she made her way to the kitchen while passing through a random series of blinking red cameras. When she reached the kitchen, Mr. Hinx was hovering over a table in front of him, his body blocking her some of her sight of what seemed to be a seated man and a chessboard. The cold air might have tried to hide the smell, but there was a faint trace of it within this part of the house. When the revelation happened, Whyte could only stand still, slightly wide-eyed, with a funny look on her face.

"What a disappointing catch." she managed to say, but with slight light-headedness. This was something she thought about for some time, only to be met by the ironic twist of faith. Mr. White and what was left of him, laid chest-out with his back rested against his seat. By his chin and just above his throat was the gunshot wound that ended his life, his rotting existence, "The rabbit is dead."

Stepping a foot forward, Whyte brought herself closer to inspect him. The hand that held her pistol trembled slightly not because she was terrified, but because in her mind she felt she should have been the one that killed him. Not that it was obligatory, but it would have been satisfying. The agent circled the scene of the crime, his gun nowhere to be found and his wallet wide open and scattered. It was undoubtedly a suicide, but the White had a guest that gave him the favour - an unfortunate favour - of a death on his own terms. When she turned away from the mess and towards his bloodied neck area, Rachel Whyte inspected the wound and immediately felt more ridiculous. Of course, but _of course -_ and she should have known. Q had said it without saying, but her arrogance got ahead of her. He was here.

Bond.

"It seems as though 007 came for tea." she concluded, looking up at Mr. Hinx who was watching her the whole time. He didn't appear to be as interested, rather, he looked like he was waiting to tell her something. She straightened herself, putting some distance between her and the corpse with folded arms, "What is it?"

"He has a computer in the basement."

Whyte swept her eyes across the open space, greeting the blinking reds she could see, "A side-effect of paranoia."

"Come with me." Mr. Hinx waved a hand for her to follow, motioning towards one of the narrow corridors that opened from the kitchen. Whyte trailed behind him, intrigued, as he budged open an unruly door that opened to a descending staircase, "After you."

She gave him one glance and proceeded down the steps of the basement. Just like the rest of the house, the basement was a mess. Yet unlike the living room, it was a characteristic chaos of wires, disassembled guns, and flashing mounted computer screens. In the middle of it all, a ragged armchair piled with blankets was angled watchfully adjacent the computer screens. An omniscient, dirty hub. This was what has become of White, the Pale King, as he lived the end of his days. She could not help but feel disappointed that someone like him decided into a pitiful retirement, should this even be fitting of the name.

"Can you open it?" Mr. Hinx spoke again, standing just a metre behind her. His question brought her attention towards the monitor in the middle of a rectangular desk, the only monitor unmounted and filled with a black and grey screen prompting for a password.

Whyte snorted at him, "If White had the security system of an amateur, then he does not deserve his legacy. However…" she tapped on the screen of her watch which rung a number into her earpiece, "…I know someone who can."

After a few rings, a voice answered from the end of the line, " _Q-Branch._ "

" **Happy and glorious, long to reign over us, God save the Queen.** " she recited line-by-line, silently convinced that the anthem was something people only knew to say but not to sing. This was true, at least, to her experience. 'Queen and country' was barely her dogma.

The other line was momentarily silent, before the voice spoke again, " _Understood._ "

A click was heard and the line was dead, followed by three timed beeps. While this process made perfect sense to her, it left Mr. Hinx in perfect confusion as the call was restricted to her earpiece. Not long after, a machine female voice surfaced, _"Authorisation: cleared. This call is now encrypted and unrecorded for high confidential purposes._ "

Another beep and another click. A man's voice greeted her, " _009._ "

"Patel." Whyte greeted in the same nature, leaning her hands against the edge of the table, her eyes glossed on the resilient computer monitor. The contents of this computer may or may note be disappointing, but Oberhauser will certainly want every little thing, "I think I'll be needing your help at the moment."

* * *

 **A/N:** Thank you for reading the eight chapter of Tessitura. Reviews/thoughts/follows are always welcome.


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